A Peruvian credit union, a Nicaraguan foundation that provides microcredit and a Christian NGO that supports small farmers and rural communities in some of the poorest areas of Brazil have won this year’s Inter-American Awards for Microenterprise Development, the Inter-American Development Bank announced today.
The IDB’s annual award for social entrepreneurship was won by Oded Grajew, founder of the Ethos Institute, a Brazilian organization that champions corporate social responsibility.
These prizes recognize the outstanding contributions of institutions and individuals that promote community development and microenterprise, a sector that generates jobs for more than 150 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean.
IDB President Enrique V. Iglesias will hand out the awards at a Monday, Sept. 9 ceremony in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, as part of the 5th Inter-American Forum on Microenterprise, which will be held in that city Sept. 9 to 11.
The forum, which is organized by the IDB’s Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise Division, will bring together more than 1,000 microenterprise specialists and microfinance practitioners.
Awards Winners
- Caja Municipal de Ahorro y Crédito de Arequipa (CMAC). This Peruvian credit union won the Excellence in Microfinance Award for Regulated Institutions for its leadership, its innovations in client services and its remarkable financial performance. CMAC-Arequipa serves more than 100,000 medium, small and micro clients through its 13-agency network in southern Peru and has plans to expand to Lima. (www.cmac-arequipa.com.pe)
- Fundación para el Apoyo a la Microempresa (FAMA). This Nicaraguan foundation won the Excellence in Microfinance Award for Non-Regulated Institutions for its solid performance, which allowed it to overcome the upheaval triggered by Hurricane Mitch. FAMA, an affiliate of the ACCION International network, has boosted its efficiency and maintained its profit margins even after cutting its interest rates, thereby offering its clients better service. (www.fama.org.ni)
- Visão Mundial. This Brazilian non-governmental organization won the Excellence in Business Development Services Award. Through its Comercio Justo y Solidario fair trade program, it provides technical assistance, training and marketing services to small farmers and rural communities and establishes direct sales channels between producers and markets inside and outside Brazil. Visão stands out for its strong management, its efforts to provide sustainable services, the high quality of its technical assistance and its defense of human rights. (www.visaomundial.org.br)
- Oded Grajew, founder and president of the Ethos Institute of Social Responsibility in Brazil, won the IDB’s Social Entrepreneurship Award. Grajew has tirelessly preached to the private sector in his country to persuade corporate leaders to support the needy, the environment and community development. Through the Ethos Institute, Grajew works with businesses to help them adopt and follow the principles of socially acceptable corporate behavior, as well as to apply ethical policies and practices in dealing with consumers, investors and communities. He is also the president of the Abrinq Foundation for the Rights of Children and Adolescents, which was founded in 1990 to support programs to eradicate child labor. (www.ethos.org.br)