Shifting the Economic Ecosystem in Turkey & beyond

The Social Innovation

Magnitude of the Problem, and its Root Causes

During their participation in the Dela Program, co-created by Ashoka and IKEA Social Entrepreneurship in 2023, the Good4Trust team reflected on the big problem and it's root causes

The linear nature of the economic system creates waste and inequality, while externalizing ecological and social costs. More and more big companies are feeling the pressure from customers, legislators and civil society to make their supply chains more socially and ecologically fair.

While most navigate the creative tensions to adhere to different standards, get different certifications and be recognized by the likes of B-Corp, some pioneers like Patagonia are leading the change.

However, unlike big companies, certifications and listings are inaccessible to small and medium sized companies, and thus that missing link serves as a barrier to them growing their business.  

To address that, Good4Trust has made it their mission to create inclusive prosumer economy communities of ecological and social just SMEs working in solidarity and deepening circular supply networks​.

Strategy to Catalyze a Network of Changemakers towards the Targeted Mission

Their field building strategy involves targeting the most strategic and influential major players to adopt their approach, while working on bringing together the field with innovators working on transforming the economic ecosystem to facilitate exchange between producers who intend to work towards fair production and prosumers.

Some of the tactics they deployed towards the mission as a part of the strategy include:

1) Collaborate with the most Strategic and Influential "Major" Players in Türkiye to help them establish "Role Model" Bazaars to Inspire rest of their Peers in the System to Adopt

The Good4Trust team partnered with the Istanbul municipality- the largest in Türkiye- to create a sub bazaar for their small and medium companies, where the producers who intend to work on making their supply chains socially and ecologically fair can exchange goods and services with prosumers who want to buy sustainably. Their sense is that if this works with the Istanbul Municipality, all other municipalities will want to do it. 

Good4Trust tried to do whatever it takes and dedicated a lot of resources for this collaboration to be successful, hoping that its success story inspires many other municipalities in Türkiye and beyond to adopt the prosumer economy approach for their communities of small and medium companies. 

It did not work out in this try given the given the lack of focus of the Municipality due to an upcoming election and changes in the bureaucrats, but the Good4Trust team will keep working on collaborating with the "major" players who could influence the rest of the system to adopt the approach.

2) Co-creating the Annual Prosumer Economy Conference with Key Players working on different Economic Models to Inform and Involve Stakeholders across Sectors  

Based on their work so far, the Good4Trust team has outlined 4 key principles of a prosumer economy approach and a network, which can be adapted by any public and private players who want to empower small and medium companies in their communities which are working towards being socially and environmentally fair. 

The Prosumer Economy Society, a separate entity established by their team, organized the first Annual Prosumer Economy Conference in Türkiye in May 2024 with Kadir Has University. The goal was to bring people working on different economic models working towards social and environmental sustainability, to introduce the prosumer economy approach and to create alliances and connections with other movements. 

Green Thought Association who has been organizing Green Economy Conferences before was one of the partners, Kadir Has University was the venue partner, the Harvard Business Review, Equal IQ (the main sustainability magazine in Türkiye), and NB Ekonomi (financial times of Türkiye) were media partners, some banks, insurance brokers and foundations were funding partners.  

Now they have brought together all the major actors in the alternative or new or next economies movement as a result of the 2024 conference in September 2025 again in Istanbul at the “Next Economies Summit 2025”. They not only create their own field now but now strengthen a much larger field for the systemic change that they aspire, an ecologically and socially fair economy, whether you call it prosumer economy or something else.