{"id":2047,"date":"2020-10-14T11:30:37","date_gmt":"2020-10-14T11:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/2020\/12\/23\/open-source-tech-for-nonprofits\/"},"modified":"2025-11-11T08:54:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-11T03:24:11","slug":"open-source-tech-for-nonprofits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/open-source-tech-for-nonprofits\/","title":{"rendered":"Open-source tech for nonprofits"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many nonprofits in India are using technology to solve their problems<\/a><\/span>. From basic and easily accessible tools to sophisticated tracking and analytics software, these solutions are helping organisations<\/a> try innovative approaches to old problems. Through our work at Project Tech4Dev<\/a>, a collaborative working with software companies and nonprofits, we have also seen many nonprofits use tech to improve the efficiency of their internal processes, including in salary processing, accounting, and documentation management and control.<\/span><\/p>

But, despite growing demand for tech solutions, nonprofits face many obstacles in developing and adopting technology that adequately serves their needs. Over the last four years, Svarya’s work with more than 40 organisations has revealed some common patterns in their trying to use technology effectively.<\/span><\/p>

Related article: Developing our digital commons<\/strong><\/a><\/p>

\"What<\/a><\/div>
1. Funding gaps<\/strong>
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The Companies Act, 2013<\/a> mandates a ceiling of 5 percent for covering administrative overheads, which many corporate funders enforce<\/a> with the nonprofits they fund. Other kinds of funders also tend to insist on minimising expenditure they consider to be an ‘overhead’. All information technology (IT) investments are generally included in this category of administrative expenses, and therefore remain underfunded. <\/span><\/p>

2. A lack of talent<\/strong><\/span><\/div>

The funding constraints that nonprofits often deal with, make hiring software developers and maintaining large IT teams near impossible for them. Even reasonably well-funded organisations lack sufficient in-house IT talent and resources, at all levels. <\/span><\/p>

3. An under-developed market<\/strong><\/span><\/div>

Software providers that serve the social sector are few and far between. In our experience, they lack business intelligence on this sector, which limits their ability to suggest suitable and affordable solutions to their nonprofit clients. <\/span><\/p>

These factors together result in an expertise- and resource-scarce environment, which produces sub-optimal solutions.<\/span><\/p>

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\"Programming

But, despite growing demand for tech solutions, nonprofits face many obstacles in developing and adopting technology that adequately serves their needs. | Picture courtesy: Libreshot<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p>

Enter open-source<\/b><\/span><\/h3>

Open-source or free software includes any software that can be publicly distributed without permission from the original creators, and can also be modified or publicly used by anyone. In some cases, there may be certain conditions that apply to users, for instance, if a user made improvements to the original software, they need to distribute the modified software for free as well.<\/span><\/p>

\"donate<\/a><\/div>

Open-source software is not heavily protected by complicated licenses and intellectual property regulations.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>

This is unlike most softwares we use, from Microsoft Office Suite on our computers to the food-delivery apps on our smartphones. ‘Proprietary softwares’ like these, are considered intellectual property (similar to books and paintings), and they are thus regulated, and protected. Unlike open-source, these softwares cannot be copied, edited, or freely shared by users.<\/span><\/p>

Open-source is usually a more suitable alternative to paid softwares for the nonprofit sector. Here’s why:<\/span><\/p>

1. Open-source software is not heavily protected by complicated licenses and intellectual property regulations. So, once a solution is developed, it can be easily replicated across organisations and shared widely for others to use and modify, without paying any additional fees to the original developers. This makes open-source software affordable and accessible in a way proprietary software is not. Its affordability also makes it an attractive proposition for funders who want to support their nonprofit partners to invest in tech. <\/span><\/p>

2. With proprietary software you can face difficulties with compatibility, especially if you are using these solutions alongside existing or older solutions—which is often the case with nonprofits. In fact, because you cannot customise or modify solutions to meet your needs, you can often become overly dependent on a single software provider. Moreover, implementing future improvements or changes will mean added cost. <\/span><\/p>

To illustrate the kinds of challenges that often come up, let’s look at an example. In 2018, a community healthcare nonprofit working in rural Maharashtra wanted a tech solution to monitor the health of community members, and also track patients at the district hospital. However, most software solutions that could be used for patient tracking were geared towards large hospital management. They were too cumbersome and expensive for a resource-constrained organisation. Further, because of its small size, this nonprofit could not get many IT vendors interested enough to develop a fully customised solution that would fit their needs. Had it not been for an open-source platform that the organisations ultimately went ahead with, they would have had to continue conducting constant field visits for manual data collection through hand-filled forms. Additionally, they would have had no choice but to spend lots of time and effort on correcting errors and updating information. Unfortunately, experiences like this one are more common than we realise.<\/span><\/p>

3. There are many open-source softwares and tools that can be picked up and used without any customisation, like in the case of tools such as WeTransfer<\/a> or CamScanner<\/a>. However, some softwares may need customisation, and will require the help of a solution provider. In most cases, these are still more affordable options than proprietary softwares.<\/span><\/p>

Related article: Are you asking the right questions when it comes to technology?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>

So, where do you begin?<\/b><\/span><\/h3>

If you are a nonprofit and want to use technology, especially open-source, here are three key questions you need to ask yourself:<\/span><\/p>

1. Is the problem I want to solve amenable to a technological solution?
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Ideally such problems would involve:<\/span><\/p>