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March 2002
Resources & Links
Activities, Web sites and other cutting-edge information for global givers
Mexico forum encourages social venture entrepreneurs
The third New Ventures Investor Forum (NVIF), in partnership with the Fondo Mexicano para la Conservación de la Naturaleza (Mexican Nature Conservation Fund), will be held in Mexico on June 20-21 with the goal of providing entrepreneurs a venue to showcase their businesses to international and regional venture capitalists and individual investors. Most participating entrepreneurs come from sectors such as organic foods and fiber, clean technologies, eco-tourism, non-timber forest products and certified wood, renewable energy and sustainable fisheries management. They present their business plans to a panel of judges made up of top business executives and investors, and winners receive business mentoring services and assistance with investor meetings until capital is secured, or for a year after the Forum. NVIF also includes roundtable discussions to educate the investment community about global market trends in environmental sectors and the role of venture capital in promoting sustainable entrepreneurship. New Ventures is a project of the Sustainable Enterprise Program of the World Resources Institute. For details, see www.new-ventures.org/investorsforums.html.
Book tells how social enterprise became big -- profitable -- business
Coming up from the Streets by Tessa Swithinbank (Earthscan, 2001) describes a British social enterprise that turned into big business, with international branches. The enterprise was a newspaper, The Big Issue (www.bigissue.com), written by professional journalists and sold by homeless or disabled people. Founded in 1991 by Gordon Roddick, husband of Body Shop founder Anita Roddick, after seeing a prototype in the US, and A. John Bird, The Big Issue now has a foundation, which provides jobs, education and training, as well as a vendor program. International editions are published in South Africa and Australia, and The Big Issue is linked with a global network of newspapers that provide support to homeless people.
New guide examines diversity funding activities in Europe
The Brussels-based European Foundation Centre (www.efc.be) has recently published Funding Minorities and Multiculturalism in Europe: Funders' Activities against Racism and for Equality in Diversity as a joint effort with the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia and the Freudenberg Stiftung. The book contains 99 detailed profiles of funders from 31 countries, reviewing each funder's mission and major activities; a special section focuses specifically on minorities and multiculturalism issues including inter-cultural relations and anti-discrimination of ethnic minorities.
On-line resource documents NGO activities in South Asia
Curious about non-profits throughout South Asia? The ProPoor InfoTech Centre Trust (www.propoor.org) can help. Established in 1998, it aims to disseminate information about sustainable development initiatives that address the needs of under-represented and marginalized sectors of society in six countries of South Asia: Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Its Internet portal contains comprehensive information on South Asian NGOs, donors and funding agencies, events, projects, and jobs. A free on-line newsletter is available by subscription.
BytesforAll
Bytes for All (www.bytesforall.org) is an Indian-based voluntary organization that provides information on Web-based resources to support development in the same countries served by the ProPoor InfoTech Centre (see item above).
© 2001 The Synergos Institute
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