RIO DE JANEIRO – Top officials of the Inter-American Development Bank’s Multilateral Investment Fund and SEBRAE, the Brazilian small and microenterprise development agency, signed the documents for a $2,075,000 grant from MIF to support a pilot program to develop industrial districts in Brazil.
MIF Manager Donald Terry, SEBRAE Director-President Júlio Sérgio de Maya Pedrosa Moreira and SEBRAE Technical Director Vinícius Lummertz Silva signed the documents at a ceremony during the 5th Inter-American Forum on Microenterprise, which is being held here on September 9, 10 and 11.
The MIF resources will support a SEBRAE project to foster the development of industrial districts, networks of companies that work in one given location and cooperate to obtain greater efficiency and competitiveness. In countries like Italy, these networks have allowed small enterprises to improve their productivity and gain access to export markets.
The project will be carried out in four locations where SEBRAE has detected potential for generating greater collaboration among companies working in the same industrial sector, as well as a strong interest on the part of local authorities to support the private sector development.
The chosen micro-regions are the lingerie production zone of Nova Friburgo, in the state of Rio de Janeiro; the leather and footwear production zone of Campina Grande, in the state of Paraiba; the wood furniture production zone of Paragominas, in the state of Para; and the textile production zone of Tobias Barreto, in the state of Sergipe.
The project will promote consolidation of production chains among the companies in each zone, the dissemination of information on potential markets, the increase of productivity through job training and technology transfer, the participation in export-oriented transactions and the attraction of foreign investments.
The MIF, an autonomous fund administered by the IDB, makes grants and investments to support private sector development and improve the climate for business in Latin America and the Caribbean.