Last month, President Bill Clinton, philanthropist Frank Giustra, and Marco A. Slim traveled to Peru and Colombia, where they visited projects of the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, an initiative of the Clinton Foundation previously known as the Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative.
During the trip, the delegation signed an agreement with the Peruvian Ministry of Foreign Trade & Tourism and launched a remote distribution project in conjunction with Nestlé and Procter & Gamble. They also inaugurated new ventures that will create jobs and train local workers in Colombia.
“The Clinton Foundation projects that we visited are helping disadvantaged communities in Latin America to lift their incomes and prosperity,” said President Clinton. “Through the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, we are helping train 20,000 workers in Cartagena for opportunities in the tourism industry, ensuring that small producers benefit from the growing hospitality sector in Cusco, and enabling female entrepreneurs in rural areas of Peru to grow their businesses. I am proud of what we have achieved in Colombia and Peru, working with the Government and with partners like the Carlos Slim Foundation, and I look forward to continuing to promote entrepreneurship and opportunity in Latin America, particularly for those at the base of the pyramid.”
Giustra added: “The Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership’s unique approach has the potential to generate meaningful impact in the developing world. We believe that by creating, scaling and replicating social enterprises in selected value chains we can help disadvantaged populations work themselves out of poverty.”
“My family is extremely proud to join this effort to bring the private sector, government, and local communities together to fight poverty by giving workers the skills they need to find jobs,” said Slim. “The best way to permanently eradicate poverty is through quality education, health care, and long term employment.”
President Clinton, Giustra, and Slim travelled to Lima, Peru, where they participated in an agreement signing between the MINCETUR (the Peruvian Ministry of Foreign Trade & Tourism) and the Clinton Foundation, which commits both parties to contribute approximately $450,000 each over the next three years to train local producers to become qualified suppliers for Cusco’s hospitality and restaurant sector. The project is expected to generate over $5,000,000 in aggregate supplier income over the next five years, with over 1,800 beneficiaries.
President Clinton, Giustra, and Slim also joined representatives from Nestlé and Procter & Gamble to formally announce the companies’ pledge to distribute discounted goods through the Chakipi network, as part of the Partnership’s developing Remote Distribution project. Chakipi, a venture of the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, was launched in January to recruit local female entrepreneurs to sell consigned goods in their own communities. This new pledge from Nestlé and Procter & Gamble will create life changing income opportunities for these women, many of whom are single heads of households. Nestlé and Procter & Gamble will also provide nutrition and hygiene training for the entrepreneurs, enabling them to add value in the sale of these products within their communities.
The delegation then traveled to Cartagena, Colombia, where they participated in the inauguration of two new ventures that will enable tens of thousands of residents to secure both employment opportunities and market access. The first was a newly-renovated warehouse whose restoration was funded by the Enterprise Partnership’s Acceso Oferta Local Productos del Caribe in collaboration with the Carlos Slim Foundation. This project will provide a local supply chain, impacting the region’s hospitality, restaurant, catering, and supermarket sector. The warehouse will provide distribution, warehousing, processing, and logistics in order to reduce costs, broaden market opportunities, and substantially increase incomes for suppliers, including farmers and fishermen residing along Colombia’s North Atlantic Coast.
President Clinton then attended the inauguration of the new Acceso Training Center, which will train 20,000 Cartagena residents over the next 10 years for work in the hospitality sector. This center will provide meaningful opportunities for the local population to participate in the burgeoning hospitality market in Cartagena. The Training Center will also provide scholarships to low-income students, made possible partly through private sector pledges from Pacific Rubiales Energy and Lewis Energy Colombia, as well as public sector pledges from the Colombia Presidential Agency of International Cooperation, USAID through a joint program executed by ACDI VOCA, and the Mayor’s Office of the City of Cartagena. In the coming years, the Center will also add vocational training programs preparing Cartagena residents for jobs in other sectors. New trainees, teachers, sponsors, and hotel executives who will hire from the Center joined President Clinton for the ceremony.
These projects will demonstrate how, by working with major multinational and regional companies, the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership is identifying existing market gaps in developing world supply or distribution and capitalizing new businesses that address those opportunities.
Source: Clinton Foundation
