TechnoServe and Argidius Foundation Expand Partnership to Scale Entrepreneurship Solutions
The partnership will enable TechnoServe to pilot and scale innovations to increase employment and opportunities in developing countries
Arlington, VA — Today, the international development nonprofit organization TechnoServe and the Argidius Foundation announced that they have expanded their partnership to scale TechnoServe’s work with entrepreneurs in developing countries across Africa, Latin America, and South Asia.
The partnership addresses a pressing need to create more economic opportunities and quality jobs in developing countries: in south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, for example, more than 70 percent of potential workers are unemployed or engaged in vulnerable employment, as is the case with 40 percent of potential workers in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Argidius support will enable TechnoServe to leverage $7 million of core funding over the next four years to build the capacity and capabilities of TechnoServe’s global entrepreneurship practice, piloting and implementing a number of strategic innovations designed to increase the reach and effectiveness of its programs. The partnership will help to advance a learning agenda and develop new financially sustainable service models. TechnoServe will also develop a suite of digital tools to make training entrepreneurs more cost-efficient and less time-consuming, as well as to facilitate measurement, learning, and knowledge exchange among entrepreneurship development practitioners.
The support from Argidius will also allow TechnoServe to expand its work in partnership with the private sector by developing shared-value initiatives with companies in new industries. This will build upon TechnoServe’s work with leading corporate partners to launch entrepreneurship and local economic development programs in more than a dozen countries across Latin America and Africa.
All told, it is estimated that the investments made through the partnership with the Argidius Foundation have the potential to quadruple the impact of TechnoServe’s entrepreneurship work by 2023.
Previous support from Argidius, dating back to 2016, has allowed TechnoServe to consolidate a global entrepreneurship practice, identify and share insights, and accelerate the growth of the organization’s programs for small businesses incubation and acceleration. With support from a number of private and public partners, TechnoServe projects helped 15,000 business owners and employees across 25 developing countries earn an additional $55 million of income in 2017. More than half the businesses participating in TechnoServe’s entrepreneurship programs are led by women, while just one-third of the total number of businesses in the countries where the organization works are owned by women. The support also helped TechnoServe raise more than $30 million for entrepreneurship programs last year, a three-fold increase from 2015.
“We’ve seen time and again that helping small businesses grow generates employment and opportunities in communities that desperately need them,” said Juan Carlos Thomas, TechnoServe’s global entrepreneurship director. “That’s why we are so excited to embark on this strategic partnership with the Argidius Foundation, which will allow us to learn, innovate, and scale up our programs.”
“We welcome this opportunity to extend our relationship with TechnoServe to further improve their successful work in entrepreneurship development,” said Nicholas Colloff, executive director of the Argidius Foundation.
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About TechnoServe
TechnoServe is a leader in harnessing the power of the private sector to help people lift themselves out of poverty. A nonprofit organization operating in 29 countries, we work with enterprising men and women in the developing world to build competitive farms, businesses, and industries. By linking people to information, capital, and markets, we have helped millions to create lasting prosperity for their families and communities. With 50 years of proven results, TechnoServe believes in the power of private enterprise to transform lives.
About the Argidius Foundation
Argidius Foundation is a family foundation that promotes enterprise solutions for poverty reduction in low and middle income countries. Its focus is on building world class business development services that are effective, accessible and sustainable and that help entrepreneurs build profitable businesses and contribute to the development of their communities.
