Karel van der Poorten
PHILIPSBURG–Produce Wealth Revolution (PWR) Agency will be hosting its first event designed to address social economy by building capacity of non-profit organisations (NPOs), social entrepreneurs, and impact-focused executives (social change agents).
Innovating Models for Progressive Advancement of Caribbean Territories (IMPACT) will combine a boot camp with a European Social Economy Regions (ESER) Conference co-sponsored by the European Commission (EC) July 15-21. IMPACT 2019 is designed to equip NPOs and social change agents with the tools to be more resilient and sustainable, it was stated in a press release.
These organisations provide an array of innovative solutions to societal challenges spanning every sector and sub-sectors of the St. Maarten economy and, by extension, the region.
Especially after the hurricanes of 2017, NPOs and other social change agents were instrumental in providing food, water, shelter and other basic needs of life. These organisations operate in their respective sectors with relative success, oblivion to their commonalities or without an understanding that they make up an important and distinguishable sub-economy and are critical to building resilient economy.
The IMPACT bootcamp will be facilitated by US collaborating partner Seam Social Labs, a New York-based social enterprise committed to 21st-century economic justice.
Tiasia O’Brien is founder of Seam Social Labs and has a vast experience of working in the non-profit realm, with expertise in fundraising, operations, and grass-root market research. O’Brien, who has Caribbean roots, will be coming with her team to empower local NPOs to build stronger teams and boards of directors, improve their fundraising efforts, and better analyse their impact, the release said.
Seam Social Labs has been working to get grants for at least five local NPOs as well. These NPOs will be announced during Global Entrepreneurship Week in November.
The boot camp is selective and can accommodate 10 NPOs. The significantly reduced cost for this boot camp includes registration, food, and ongoing support until the announcement in November 2019.
The European Commission co-sponsored ESER Conference will take place immediately following. The key facilitator will be Karel van der Poorten of the European Commission, who has extensive expertise in social economy and entrepreneurship development.
The conference is being coordinated in collaboration with the Anguilla Youth Business Foundation and Montserrat’s Department of Youth and Sports. These organisations will be in attendance with NPOs from these islands.
Some of the topics that will be discussed are social economy, social innovation as a new sector, business models, innovative finance, and strategic cooperation models.
NPOs, social entrepreneurs, and impact-focused executives will be in highly informative and interactive sessions July 20-21 which will provide the environment to build network and work to solve some of the most pressing challenges that social change agents face.
St. Maarten-based Foresee (4C) Foundation has also partnered with PWR Agency to make this a reality. 4C-Foundation recently launched its most recent programme, NPOwer, to strengthen the communication and collaboration of NPOs through its platform. It is also focused on building its members’ capacity members.
For this reason, it will not only assist in informing NPOs, but will contribute US $100 to the $250 registration fees of the first 15 St. Maarten-based registered attendees.
To benefit from this opportunity, registrants are asked to sign up on the NPOwer platform. The registration fees go directly toward covering the cost of the event.
For more information about IMPACT 2019 and registration, email
info@experiencepwr.com or
info@daretoimpact.org or WhatsApp +1-721-523-1842. Registration can be done online at
http://tiny.cc/impactus.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/88716-impact-2019-focuses-on-social-entrepreneurship-non-profits
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