Jochen Ebert, General Manager of Danone India / South Asia, is recently become head of Grameen Danone Foods Ltd.
I decided to know more on his functions, his plans for GDFL…

Could you talk about your previous experiences and current situation in Danone Group?

I was already linked with Groupe Danone in the early 90’s as student and “stagiaire”. In 1996 I started as BM for Actimel in Danone Germany and continued till 2001 when I was responsible for the marketing groups “Health” (Actimel and Activia) and “Dessert” (Dany Sahne). After that I was responsible as Marketing Director for the Danone – Al Safi JV in Saudi Arabia. After 2 years outside of Danone I am now responsible for Danone India and South Asia since June 2006.

What about Danone in South Asia? What are the prospects in this emerging region?

South Asia today is “virgin land” for Danone. Currently the only operative business is our social business project with Grameen in Bangladesh. Next to that we are convinced that India and Pakistan are representing major opportunities for the Dairy pole – not only due to the huge number of consumers, but also due to the deeply rooted dairy tradition existing in theses countries. We are in an advanced stage of planning for both countries and hope to start selling in 2009

Who was at the origin of the rapprochement between your team and Grameen Danone Foods Ltd?

After the initial phase of the project where the focus was laid on building an affordable “low Capex” factory in Bogra under the lead of Guy Gavelle, it was clear that after the launch further expertise was needed in all functions of the business. Bernard Hours, Emmanuel Faber and Felix Martin consequently decided to integrate Bangladesh in the regional Dairy structure. This process was initiated in the 2. quarter of 2008 and we are very positive about the cooperation between the Bangladesh, the regional and the global teams .

How is the transition with Emmanuel Marchant going on?

Excellent. We are all aware that we are still a very small company with a lot of improvement potential in all functions. But we see progress on all fronts and we are happy to have Emmanuel with us who knows the history of the company … and anyhow he will remain very involved in his role within danone communities.

Concretely, how the collaboration is going on between Danone and GDFL people? What does Danone South Asia bring to GDFL and what could your people learn from GDFL?

A big part of the expertise needed we have to develop together as a team, namely how to create a sustainable social business with very affordable products. Obviously Danone impact focuses on our areas of strengtgh as R&D, Quality, Supply chain and finance. GDFL not only takes the lead in establishing the Grameen ladies sales force and making them a key element in the brand communication, they also manage all major corporate governance issues. Obviously the support of Prof. Yunus and his team is of huge importantance to understand the specificities of the country.

What are your plans for the further development of GDFL?

We first want to find a sustainable business model for the Bogra area – major challenge is to further fine tune product positioning and price points. This would then enable us to further roll-out in neighbouring regions and would eventually lead to the establishment of further factories in Bangladesh.

When was your first trip in Bangladesh and what were your feelings about the country and GDFL?

I first went to Bangladesh in May 2007. Bangladesh makes you aware that major global problems can be very concrete for the common man, be it the visible malnutrition of kids in the country, be it the threat via a dramatic increase of cost for food and fuel or be it via the very imminent threat caused by global warming and the rising of water levels. On the other side I am deeply impressed by the friendliness of the people and the natural beauty of this country and I think we can all be very proud that GDFL will contribute very positively to the further development of the country.

Kids eating shocktidoi, find other pictures on  danone.communities by Flickr

Finally what does the social business represent according to you? How would it possible to raise the social impact of the project?

We at Danone just started to experiment with social business models. The key factor to make it a success is “significance”. A major social impact can only be achieved when we are talking about a volume business that reaches the majority of people in need.

Savez-vous qu’en ce moment se déroule un tournoi de football planétaire ?
Il s’agit de la Danone Nations Cup, compétition se déroulant dans quarante pays et à laquelle participent des équipes d’enfants âgés de 10 à 12 ans.
Le tournoi se déroule dans un premier temps à l’échelle nationale, ensuite la meilleure équipe de chaque pays se retrouve au Parc des Princes à Paris pour le tournoi final. En ce qui concerne le Bangladesh, la compétition regroupe des équipes issues de 10 écoles de Bogra.

Lundi 30 mai, premier match.

J’arrive alors que la cérémonie d’ouverture ne débutera que dans une heure. Cela me permet de faire le tour du terrain, de discuter avec les représentants du club de football local qui nous aident à organiser l’évènement. Ils ont ainsi disposé des bannières géantes, des posters, des drapeaux aux couleurs de Grameen Danone Foods et du Shokti Doi autour du terrain et sur les murs de l’enceinte. La cérémonie d’ouverture est notamment marquée par un lâcher de colombes et le salut à tous les joueurs auxquels je participe avec plaisir tant l’atmosphère est festive.
Le match débute avec un peu de retard. Je suis surpris par la qualité technique de certains joueurs alors que le terrain est détrempé, à la limite de l’impraticable suite aux pluies torrentielles tombées récemment en cette période mousson. Je suis ainsi frappé par le talent de certains joueurs de la « Police Line School », école située dans le quartier de la police comme son nom l’indique. Finalement cette équipe gagne le match 2 buts à zéro. Nous sommes très enthousiastes à l’issue de cette première étape, l’ambiance était excellente et le match très intéressant. La nature de cet événement résonne avec de nombreuses valeurs importantes pour Danone : ouverture, plaisir du jeu, fair-play, et accessibilité. En pensant au Shokti Doi, impossible de ne pas penser également, aux bienfaits que la pratique du sport a pour la santé

Mardi 22 juin, la finale.

J’arrive en avance comme lors de la cérémonie d’ouverture pour observer le terrain, « prendre la température ». Je suis impressionné, plusieurs dizaines de spectateurs sont déjà sur place.
Je suis à peine sur place qu’une pluie lourde commence à tomber, cela ne sera pas un après-midi de tout repos pour moi car je suis chargé de prendre des photos de l’évènement.
Il est 16H00 quand le match débute, je retrouve sans surprise, tant ses joueurs m’avaient fait forte impression lors du match d’ouverture, l’équipe de la « Police Gate Line School ». En face nous retrouvons la « Coronation school ». Je suis stupéfait par le nombre élevé de spectateurs. D’après des journalistes locaux, 5 000 personnes au bas mot assistent au match !!! Incroyable, même s’il n’est pas inutile de rappeler que les bangladeshis sont passionnés par le football : à titre d’exemple, des millions de téléspectateurs avaient regardé le match que Zinedine Zidane avait joué avec des jeunes bangladeshis il y a deux ans lors de l’inauguration de l’usine de Bogra.
Mais revenons au match, les conditions étaient difficiles lors du match d’ouverture mais que dire de cette finale. Des trombes d’eau tombent sans discontinuer sur le terrain qui était déjà détrempé avant le coup d’envoi. Les conditions sont dantesques mais les joueurs à force de courage et de talent arrivent à se créer des occasions de buts. La « Coronation Shool » domine légèrement les débats mais la « Police Line School » marque un but… refusé pour une action partie à l’extrême limite du hors-jeu. En seconde période la « Coronation Shool » accentue la pression et finie par marquer un but, à ce moment, j’assiste à une explosion de joie démesurée comme je n’en avais jamais vécue de ma vie, du moins en direct et sans écran de télévision interposé. Le terrain est envahi par des centaines de supporters enthousiastes, j’ai l’impression d’être à la Bomborena ou au Maracana, stades mythiques d’Amérique du Sud, tant l’ambiance est bouillante ! Le match reprend ensuite son cours, après plusieurs minutes d’interruption, sans que le score évolue. Bis repetita lors du coup de sifflet final, le terrain est à nouveau envahi par les supporters de la « Coronation School » qui peuvent cette fois laisser libre cours à leur bonheur. Ils prennent les joueurs sur leurs épaules, et improvisent des danses sur le terrain.

Les joueurs de la « Coronation School » sont hilares. Ils reçoivent chacun un magnifique trophée des mains de Mr Nabi, directeur de Grameen Danone Foods, ainsi que des représentants de la Grameen Bank et du club de football local. Et cerise sur le gâteau, ils iront découvrir Paris lors du tournoi final en septembre !

Notre album photo sur Flickr ici.

Every thursday, in Paris (and in many cities in the world), entrepreneurs are discussing about their projects around cups of coffee. Informal sessions: great moments to network, share experiments, challenge ideas and build new projects. (In Paris, the group is organised on FaceBook, with more of 850 members).

Open Coffee : nice talk about finance2. (from left to right : Georges, Julien, Jean-Christophe, Olivier = me :), première mise en ligne par danone.communities

I had the pleasure to talk with Jean-Christophe Capelli about new formq of micro-financing through the web. Web2.0 trends are infiltrating different sectors… banking too. We had, then, an interesting conversation about initiatives as Prosper, Zopa, MicroPlace, Kiva and MyC4… new lands for peer to peer micro-credit. Thanks to these websites, people from one side of the planet could lend money to others, who have projects, on the other side of the globe… all in few clicks of a mouse. A new form of disintermediation, enhancing people to create value, horizontally, with people. For sure, @ danone.communities we are very interested in this kind of financing. With IDEAM, we have been pioneers in Socially Responsible Investment with our SICAV… but we are still imaging new ways to reinforce the adhesion of our communities to our projects. (to be continued… if you have any idea about this topic, don’t hesitate to contact us)

As an example of new ways to finance projects, let’s share here the story of Open Art Gallery. A group of relatives wanted to get some modern art pieces… hard to buy one on his own. Jean-Christophe, Christophe and their friends organised a “tontine”: a loan system from peer to peer. With this system, they will get enough money, on a large period of time, to buy different pieces and share them, month to month, inside their community. You could find a picture of their first beautiful investment here.

Behind this trivial example, Jean-Christophe is working on real laboratories for new forms of loans. He started with La Tontine des Bloggers… be very active to initiate and develop BarcCampBank (participative conference about the banking sector). It is only a beginning… Let’s discover (sorry in french) the new perspectives of finance throught the web2.0 :

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I’ve just joined the danone.communities team and will be responsible of the “.communities” part of our project.

My role goes from:

• promoting the life and development of our initiatives, through our blog
• paving the way to our global web strategy, to recruit and develop an international public: contributing to Wikipedia, reaching new visitors thanks Netvibes, Flickr, Youtube, FaceBook, Twitter… (and other New Media references)
• animating our community , thanks to our next collaborative platform (still under-construction), wish will let us share ideas, discuss about social business issues and build new forms of adhesion (commenting, spreading the news, giving time, subscribing to our fund)
• building bridges between virtual and real worlds: organising events about Social Business, recruiting new members for danone.communities.

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I am very proud to join these enthralling initiatives. I wanted to thank all the pioneers who started this venture. From my background (you will find some details here), particularly in the web sector (as business developer with vpod.tv), I will remain vibrant convictions about our upcoming world. Another world is possible… Social Business could be part of this new deal.As my first blog post here, I wanted to share with you a video from Guy Kawasaki, one of the first Apple Evangelist (it is not about religion but technology! ;). Guy has become a great reference about entrepreneurship and capital venture. He got famous with his book “the Art of the Start” and had a personal blog “How to change the world“.

Here, at Stanford University, he is explaining how entrepreneurship could start with a vision to “make the world a better place, to make meanings”…

As Guy says in a very different sector, (ensuring sustainable economic activities, developing products that have high nutritional values and are affordable for the poorest individuals): let’s right a wrong together!

It is our great pleasure that Grameen Danone Foods Ltd. has organized a training program with the cooperation of Danone South India. This was the first training session of this kind.

Bibhu P. Nanda, Sales & Distribution Director of Danone India & Marie Soubeiran, Marketing Manager of Danone India were the trainers. As you know it was held on 8th – 9th June 2008 at Bogra. Attendees were Sales & Distribution Managers, all the Sales Assistants of GDFL and all the Regional Sales Managers of GDFL. All the participants attended the training session spontaneously. The topic was Basic Selling Skill, which was very much effective.

All the participants learnt about the personal selling skill, which has become very much helpful to them. For instance, they are going to dissociate the sales and the distribution in order to work in a more effective way. I noted that Bibhu’s speech was very much friendly to the sales assistants so that they were very much pleased to attend this training session.

The second day was a half-day market visit. After getting the theoretical knowledge of personal selling skill, they applied it practically in the field during the market visit. It was a great opportunity for the sales assistants to develop themselves by handling practically the relationship with retailers in front of the trainers.

At the closing ceremony there was a dinner all together. I had the opportunity to talk with Marie about communication and marketing, it was a great pleasure because I’m keen to develop my knowledge in these areas for my job and for myself as well.
Obviously, this dinner was also a source of motivation for the sales people. They discussed a long time with Mr Bibhu.

I strongly believe, by organizing this type of training session in future we can develop all the GDFL sales people’s skills as well as their motivation.

Nous vendons nos Shokti Doi dans la ville de Rajshahi depuis maintenant presque deux mois. Sohel et moi avons donc voulu nous rendre compte sur place si notre succès initial ne s’était pas démenti depuis l’inauguration de notre bureau local. J’ai ainsi pu, durant une visite de deux jours, observer la situation à Rajshahi.

Petit rappel : nous approvisionnons notre antenne locale de Rasjhahi à l’aide d’un camion réfrigéré qui effectue les 5H00 de route aller-retour tous les deux jours avec Bogra, lieu de production du yaourt. Sur place, l’équipe est composée de Zaman, directeur des ventes, et des assistants vente Forhad et Enamul. Ils se chargent de vendre puis distribuer les Shokti Doi aux détaillants. Après seulement deux mois d’activité, Zaman et son équipe ont composé un portefeuille de clientèle d’une grosse centaine de magasins et ils sont en pleine expansion, bravo à eux !

Lundi 23 juin, 7H00. Je dois quitter Bogra, par bus, en compagnie de Sohel directeur des ventes, pour rejoindre Rasjahahi afin d’y représenter Danone auprès de nos partenaires, clients et prospects. Sohel a du retard. Tandis que je patiente, quelques personnes me demandent de quel pays je viens. Tranquillement, nous évoquons les mérites respectifs du Bangladesh et de la France. Mais bientôt c’est une véritable petite cohue qui se forme autour de moi; j’ai soudain la sensation d’être un animal en cage avec tous ces yeux qui me dévisagent ! Sohel arrive sur ces entrefaites. Tandis que nous nous engouffrons dans le bus il m’explique, hilare, que les Bangladeshis sont par nature curieux et qu’ils n’ont pas l’habitude de voir des occidentaux. J’ai effectivement pu le vérifier à d’autres occasions, mais ces mouvements de foule autour du simple fait que je suis un Occidental ne cessent de me surprendre.

Après 2H30 de trajet en bus, nous voici à Rajshahi où nous retrouvons Zaman et son équipe. Après un point sur la situation, nous commençons la visite des détaillants du centre-ville. Je suis impressionné par la taille des magasins de Rajshahi, en moyenne beaucoup plus grands que ceux de Bogra ; il est évident que le potentiel de cette ville est immense. Zaman nous présente à ses différents clients boutiquiers, lesquels sont flattés de l’attention que GDFL leur porte en dépêchant son Directeur des ventes, Sohel, et un représentant de Danone.

A Gauche, Sohel, Zaman et un commerçant. A droite, l’équipe de Rajshahi

Le lendemain, mardi 24, Zaman vient nous chercher à l’hôtel à 8H30 et nous partons visiter d’autres échoppes où l’accueil est également excellent.

Les échanges avec ces commerçants sont plein d’enseignements, ils nous permettent d’évaluer les actions sur lesquels nous devons progresser. On apprend par exemple que nous devrions utiliser la presse écrite comme moyen de promotion, d’autres parlent du goût du Shokti Doi et de bien d’autres choses encore… Tout cela donnera matière à réflexion une fois rentré à Bogra.

Petite anecdote savoureuse : un commerçant porte un T-shirt avec l’inscription « Breizh power », ma région d’origine ! Décidément, Rajshahi ne finit pas de me surprendre : après les kilts écossais de la fanfare de la police, voici donc la Bretagne qui se montre. Il ne manque plus qu’une crêperie…

L’après-midi touche à sa fin. Zaman nous raccompagne en rickshaw jusqu’à la station de bus. Je quitte Rajshahi en me promettant de revenir dans cette ville sympathique, vivante, accueillante.

Mr Wahidun Nabi is the Executive Director of Grameen Danone Foods Ltd. He kindly agreed to answer a few questions about him and his role in GDFL

What did you do before working for GDFL?
I have completed my Post Graduation in Agricultural Economics. My career started in British Origin Multi National Company called ICI Ltd where I have served 20 years with a trend of increasing ranges of responsibilities in Sales, Marketing, Factory and overall operation of agro chemicals and FMCG products. After that, I joined in the biggest food industry of Bangladesh named PRAN Ltd. as Head of Operations of Dairy and Beverage products. During my tenure PRAN has penetrated in dairy and beverage business with a gradual trend of increase in the local as well as international market. Their beverage includes Carbonated Beverage, mineral water, Juice, Flavoured drinks etc.

And what about the dairy?
In the dairy part PRAN is selling pasteurized and UHT plain Milk as well as Flavoured milk. After 3 years of serving PRAN I have joined in another giant group which is also involved in dairy products as well as other FMCG product. At present, I am the member of Dairy of Association of Bangladesh, before that I was member of Bangladesh Agricultural Association. I have received dozens of Training from Home and abroad related to Sales, Marketing, Accounts and TQM. I was the System Coordinator of ISO 9001.

In which circumstances were you hired?
Back in August ‘07 I have joined this organization when GD was facing the transition of perception by General people about the mission of a Social Business Enterprise. I snatched the opportunity to season myself also with the Social mission for which GD has been incorporated.

Mr Wahidun visiting sale-assistants of GDFL

” My first objective was to publicize

the product as much as possible within mass people

and to ensure the availability “

What was your aim when you accepted to work for GDFL?
I had to face two quite opposing forces in terms of the sustainability of this holy mission of GD. For instance, yogurt is not at all in the daily list of intake of the population belonging to the Bottom of the Pyramid, at the same time marketing yogurt at Bogra, the place which has its own years old tradition of being famous for local yogurt. Meanwhile, our approach was different from the typical methods used for the production of a new dairy product, because our team and product concept were completely new. In addition, the taste, smell, packaging, quantity all these variables created a mixed state of general reaction which took quite a long time to have the alignment of GDs objectives. After joining here, my first objective was to publicize the product as much as possible within mass people and to ensure the availability. In the context of Bangladesh, this kind of product with such affordability was unique, and I emphasized on extensive training program at the Grameen Bank centre, our sales force, rural sales ladies and also promotion in line with proximity marketing among the target customers.

How do you manage the joint-venture between Danone and Grameen Bank? What are your relations with Emmanuel Marchant, the head of danone.communities, how do you share the roles between yourselves?
I am responsible for overall Operation that includes Sales, Marketing, New Product Development, Supply Chain, Production, Distribution and Accounts. I have to comply the terms and conditions that are mentioned in the Joint Venture Agreement and the Board Resolution as and when resolved. My relationship with Mr. Emmanuel Marchant is within the arrangement of Professional bonding and in this connection I tried to share with him all the relevant issues and ideas that need the consensus of both the entity.

” an effort with synergy to do

something for the deprived ones “

What is your vision of the social business in general and how do you concretise it in GDFL? What in your opinion could we improve in the GDFL social business?
Like the individuals that constitute society, companies constitute whole industry and down the road the unit is each individual. As an individual, all of us have their own responsibility towards society and that is the starting point. Organizations should be respectful towards the society and to the overall development of the nation.  It is always true that there will be discrimination among rich and poor but once the individuals of the organization start thinking as a whole to reduce the gap it becomes an effort with synergy to do something for the deprived ones. Social business in a sense covers the dual core compliance, for instance, the owners didn’t look for the dividend. On the other hand, to make the business a success, they deliver their all-out effort to minimize costs, which results in ultimate sustainability without making big expenses. Without minimizing the cost it is not pragmatic at all to offer something in an affordable manner. From the short experience of 1 year, it is evident that subsidization from the Joint Venture partners can’t last long; instead, the best thing will be to earn the subsidy from the rich community by offering a premium product and contributing it to the population at the bottom of the pyramid.

What about the future of GDFL? What about the next factory?
I found it very promising subject to fulfilling certain pre requisites like local customized taste, affordability, long shelf life, proper cold chain, timely distribution, product differentiation, increase the operational network in more areas. Based upon the capacity need in line with the successful expansion program we will go for the next factory.

Could you talk about your country and its people? What do you like and what do you like less? Do you have the feeling that through micro-credit and social business invention by Mr Yunus that Bangladesh is the place to be when it comes to fighting poverty?
My country is agro based and 80 % of our rural community is engaged with agriculture. As a developing country 87% our rural people are landless and they are also closely related with seasonal agricultural activities. Poverty in the rural areas is the curse which they are carrying from generation to generation. Education in the primary level has started through so many supports from Govt. and NGOs. My countrymen are friendly naive by nature and peace loving. They are very much cordial and hospitable to the foreigners although their poverty limits them to do something exaggerated. As a professional I always strongly believe in professional attitude in work place at the same time transparency, openness, responsibility and promptness in decision making and execution. I feel uncomfortable when the mentioned attributes are not present to the surroundings. It is already proved worldwide that the micro credit concept through the Grameen Bank under the leadership of Nobel Laureate Prof. M Yunus is an unique way to help the rural people to eliminate the curse of Poverty. Of course, I strongly believe Bangladesh is the right place for fighting poverty by the invention of Social Business and Micro Credit by Prof. Yunus as both the concept is targeting the population consists of the Bottom of the pyramid within affordable means.

I am Nazmul Hossain, I have worked in Grameen Danone Foods Ltd as a Quality Control Officer since the beginning, the 1^st product launching in the market. Guy Gavelle and Philippe Camus have supervised the product development of Shokti Doi, as per the requirements of consumers.

The first recipe Danone set up lacked of thickness with a viscosity of 8 000 units. But our customers wanted more viscosity. So I worked to increment it with the suggestion of Mr. Gavelle and Camus. I earned success in increasing the thickness by doing research work and finally we set the viscosity from 16 000 to 20 000 units. Since then, I have always tried to maintain the thickness of our product in order to fulfill the consumers’ requests.

At present time, I am working with Mr.Anouj Mehta who is the representative of Danone South Asia in Research and Development Section. We are working for the development of new products for Grameen Danone Foods Ltd. But before, Anouj wanted to rearrange the recipe for getting higher sweetness in Shokti Doi to fulfill the consumers’ taste.

So I worked with Mr.Anouj on three test recipes last week. We went to the market and near a school where we made consumers preference tests, after that we selected the best recipe according to the test results, so that, the Shokti Doi will evolve very soon !

To summarize, we do our best in order to improve the Shoktidoi to propose to our customers the best product as possible.

Grameen Danone Foods est encore une très jeune entreprise qui fait face à de multiples défis. Le contexte est passionnant mais tendu, avec l’augmentation du coût des matières premières - et donc du lait. Afin de nous aider à améliorer nos méthodes dans les fonctions marketing, vente, production, ainsi que la Recherche & Développement, Danone Inde s’est dernièrement rapproché de nous.

Jochen Ebert, Manager de Danone Asie du Sud, et Marie Soubeiran, Responsable marketing de Danone Inde, nous ont déjà donné de précieux conseils lors d’une précédente visite.

Aujourd’hui, nous allons parler « vente » et plus particulièrement vente de notre yaourt Shokti Doi. Bibhu Nanda, Directeur Vente et Distribution de Danone Inde vient dispenser une formation commerciale aux assistants vente de Grameen Danone Foods. S’il est certain que ces derniers disposent, pour la plupart, d’une bonne expérience, ils n’ont cependant jamais suivi de formation théorique. Bibhu Nanda doit leur permettre de formaliser leurs connaissances commerciales pour optimiser leurs pratiques.

Dimanche 8 juin, 13H30. Nous sommes une vingtaine à nous installer dans la salle de conférence climatisée de l’hôtel Red Chilli, un des meilleurs établissements de Bogra avec son restaurant réputé pour la qualité de sa cuisine chinoise.

Toute la force de vente de Grameen Danone Foods est rassemblée derrière notre directeur Wahidun Nabi. Bibhu Nanda, accompagné de Marie Soubeiran, prépare ses notes. Puis il commence…

Il nous explique dans le détail ce qui « fait » un bon vendeur. Nous étudions ensuite les techniques de planification, de gestion des stocks, la tenue des registres de ventes, la prise de commande, la gestion des réclamations client… Les assistants-ventes sont extrêmement attentifs, nous savons tous que les enjeux sont importants : le succès de notre social business dépend en effet du succès des ventes de Shokti Doi.

Sympathique attention à la fin de cette intense journée de formation : nous recevons un polo et une casquette aux couleurs de Grameen Danone Foods Ltd. Nous voilà parés pour la suite du programme.

Le lendemain, lundi 9 juin, 8H00. Voici le moment de la mise en pratique des conseils évoqués la veille : il va maintenant falloir vendre des Shokti Doi ! Pour pimenter la situation - et stimuler tout le monde – Biddhu Nanda nous divise en deux groupes avec une récompense promise à l’équipe qui vendra le plus de yaourts…

Notre équipe quitte l’usine à pied, sous une pluie battante. C’est bientôt la fin de l’été et la mousson s’installe durablement sur le sous-continent indien. Nous nous dirigeons vers le centre de Bogra où nous pensons trouver le plus grand nombre de clients potentiels. En chemin, nous nous arrêtons dans les échoppes pour vendre nos yaourts et pour proposer aussi des posters et bannières « Shokti Doi ». Cela augmentera notre visibilité dans ces petits points de vente qui constituent l’essentiel du tissu commercial de Bogra. La pluie finit par laisser place au soleil ; ce qui rend notre itinéraire - une dizaine de kilomètres – moins pénible.

Nous achevons cette matinée de vente très contents de nous, certains d’être la meilleure équipe car nous avons beaucoup plus vendu que prévu, à tel point que nous avons dû envoyer un membre de notre équipe à l’usine pour nous ravitailler en yaourts. Nous arrivons donc au Red Chilli, pour le déjeuner, le sourire aux lèvres et sûrs de notre fait… C’est alors que Wahidun Nabi nous annonce que l’autre équipe a réalisé de meilleures ventes ! Passé le petit moment de déception, nous félicitons nos « adversaires » d’un jour.

L’après-midi est consacrée au debriefing ; les assistants ventes donnent leur ressenti, Bibhu Nanda et Marie Soubeiran détaillent les points qu’ils devront travailler pour améliorer leurs ventes, sans oublier qu’ils sont aussi de véritables ambassadeurs de la mission nutritive et sociale de Grameen Danone Foods. L’objectif social et sociétal de Grameen Danone Foods constitue la toile de fond, la raison d’être, de nos actions commerciales autour de Shokti Doi. Et je suis frappé de voir à quel point tous les collaborateurs vivent au quotidien avec cette mission à l’esprit.

Nous terminons cette journée de travail par un jeu de rôles où chacun prend tour à tour la place du vendeur Grameen Danone Foods et celle du boutiquier ; un exercice non seulement formateur mais aussi très amusant, où les fous rires bientôt emplissent la salle ! Quant à la récompense promise, un bon d’achat valable dans la principale boutique de Bogra, à la meilleure équipe de la compétition matinale, elle est finalement accordée aux deux groupes.

C’est dans cette bonne ambiance que la journée s’achève au restaurant du Red Chilli… Voulez-vous connaître le menu ? Du poulet, du bœuf avec du riz, mais surtout des rires, des sourires, une vraie chaleur humaine. Tous ensembles, nous avons passé un moment vraiment sympa. Les Bangladeshis sont formidables !

« Face à l’émergence de défis mondiaux, les grands groupes internationaux sont dorénavant appelés à jouer un rôle de premier plan dans la lutte contre la pauvreté ou la protection de l’environnement. Rien d’étonnant à cela, si l’on considère que le chiffre d’affaires d’un BP est 90 fois supérieur au PIB du Niger. Aucune réponse efficace ou durable ne pourra être apportée aux grands enjeux planétaires sans une participation active de ces acteurs majeurs du développement. »

“Point de vue” de Jean-Michel Sévérino, Directeur Général de l’AFD (Association Française de Développement) dans la Tribune, le 11 juin.

Jean-Michel Sévérino est membre du conseil d’administration de danone.communities.