Root Capital Founder, William Foote, was officially inducted into an international fellowship by Ashoka: Innovators for the Public at a special ceremony on February 25 at the new Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County. Foote was one of 21 social entrepreneurs to be honored in the Seventh Annual North American Fellowship Induction Program. "Ashoka Fellows create pattern-changing solutions for the most pressing social problems of our day," says Ashoka's U.S. Director Barbara Kazdan. "Although Ashoka U.S. is only seven years old, we have identified the most inventive and dedicated social entrepreneurs to join with their peers to elevate and strengthen the 'citizen sector' here and around the world." Once elected, Fellows benefit from being part of the Ashoka fellowship for life.

Open your kitchen cabinets. If you see vanilla, there's a one-in-five chance it came from Indonesia, the second-largest vanilla producer worldwide. Farmers from the island of Lombok have produced the flavoring for generations; they would sell unprocessed beans to local traders but had never been able to market directly to exporters due to their limited capacity for processing. Lately, that situation has begun to change thanks to Root Capital and our partner ForesTrade Indonesia (FTI), a sustainable trade company whom we are loaning $100,000 to purchase vanilla from six Lombok villages.

Root Capital recently issued a $500,000 loan to the coffee producer association Koperasi Baitul Qiradh Baburrayyan (KBQB) in support of family farmers cultivating organic-certified coffee in the Gayo mountain region of Aceh, Indonesia. KBQB's technical assistance to farmers and marketing to international buyers are creating economic opportunities and catalyzing the recovery of a once-volatile region.

Although legally registered in 2002, KBQB could not export its Arabica coffee until 2005 when the violent civil conflict raging in Aceh since 1976 subsided. Operating in a region that is also still recovering from the tsunami in December, 2004, KBQB's growth has been dramatic: it achieved sales of $1.5 million in its first year of full operations in 2006 and then tripled its sales to $4.5 million in 2007. KBQB had almost 5,000 members in 2007 and expects to surpass 6,800 in 2008 as families who were displaced during the conflict return home and rehabilitate dormant land.

Six new staff members joined the Root Capital team in the past few months. In the Cambridge office, we're proud to welcome Director of Marketing & Communications Sara Aviel; Finance and Office Assistant Stella Klemperer; Accounting Manager Jennifer Neira; and Investment Officer Luis Miguel Ormeno. In our field offices we are excited to have Investment Officer German Ampuero on board in Peru and Monitoring Assistant Evelyn Rodas in Guatemala.