New business in new markets

Monday, July 17, 2006

Excerpt: Despite some progress, the Millennium Development Goals remain elusive. The role of the private sector in helping to deliver these goals is increasingly being recognized, and many are urging the business community to mobilize and strengthen its contribution to poverty-reduction strategies. A partnership between the Netherlands’ development organization SNV and the WBCSD aims at helping companies in Central America and the Andean regions do more “pro-poor business”, especially bringing SMEs into their supply chains.

Dung Van Anh works on a Lafarge project aiming to bring small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in China into their supply chain. Dung is of Chinese descent, was raised in Vietnam, and is now working in his ancestral homeland.

Robert de Jongh runs the Latin American operations of the Netherlands development organization SNV. He was born in Brazil and grew up in the United States. He has helped Pronaca, a large Ecuadorian company and member of the WBCSD?s Regional Network partner in Ecuador, recruit a collection of small corn producers to supply corn as feed for the chickens the company is raising. Prior to the linkage, the farmers were earning less than US$ 2 a day, while Pronaca was faced with fluctuating corn prices and an unstable supply.

Source: World Business Council for Sustainable Development (link opens in a new window)