Canadian wins humanitarian award
Burlington native’s company helped 500,000 people with iron deficiency around the world
While volunteering at Kenya’s overcrowded Dadaab refugee camp in 2011, Gavin Armstrong found himself wondering how to create long-term solutions to the world’s problems.
He said he saw 700,000 people in a camp designed for 100,000, witnessing malnutrition and human suffering on such a large scale that it “galvanized him,” and gave him the courage to start his company, Lucky Iron Fish.
“We must address longer-term issues to create change, so that’s where I got really energized around social enterprise,” he said.
So far, the company has helped 500,000 people with iron deficiency around the world since it was launched in 2012.
Armstrong’s fish is a reusable cast-iron gadget that can be boiled in water for 10 minutes a day to give the user a low dose of iron. It can be used for up to five years and can benefit entire families.
This year, the 29-year-old Burlington native was named one of the “Six Core Principle” recipients of the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award, given annually to six humanitarians under the age of 30. Armstrong was also named one of Forbes’ Top 30 Under 30 in the social entrepreneur category, and won the EOY Social Entrepreneur special citation award.
“Iron deficiency is the world’s largest nutritional challenge,” said Armstrong, who works out of his office in Guelph. “It impacts two billion people, one-third of the world suffers from it.”
About 20 per cent of Canadians have iron deficiency, which is f airly low. But in some countries, such as India, 80 per cent of the population suffers from it. Low iron can lead to fatigue, hair loss and brittle nails, but it can also cause limited cognitive development, lowered kidney and liver function, and death.
Kristen Desautels has been using the fish for about three years, since she got pregnant with her daughter, to improve her low energy levels.
“Once I learned about it I thought it seemed like a great natural way of getting some increased iron instead of getting supplements,” said Desautels, who now sells the gadget at her Guelph restaurant.
So far, Armstrong estimates that more than 100,000 iron fish have been sold around the world. The company is now working on several projects, including a partnership with the Sahara Foundation to help people with HIV in India.
People living with HIV can’t take iron supplements, Armstrong said, because they clash with their medication. By using the Lucky Iron Fish instead, they are exposed to a lower and “more gentle dose” of iron which he says is manageable. Last year, they started a program to send the fish to Indigenous communities in Canada, because Indigenous people have rates of iron deficiency two or three times higher than the average Canadian. So f ar, 5,000 fish have been sent through a buyone-get-one initiative. “For every fish we sell, we commit to donate one fish for free to a family around the world,” Armstrong said. He is also hopeful they will soon be able to partner with a United Nations agency to run a pilot project. “This is really a women’s health issue,” he said, because impoverished women of reproductive age are more likely to be affected. Armstrong believes that companies engaged in social enterprise, like Lucky Iron Fish, are the future of business. “I feel that there’s sometimes a sense that having an impact organization is an added cost or an added burden and I don’t believe that,” he said. “I’d like to use Lucky Iron Fish as an example that not only being a social business is not an added cost, it’s a revenue opportunity.”