By PR From Nation News

Scotiabank has partnered with the Barbados-headquartered Caribbean Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Livelihoods (CoESL) to enhance sustainable development through entrepreneurship in the Caribbean.

The two entities’ Bridging the Gap Project will kick off during the Caribbean’s celebration of Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) from November 17 to 23, 2014. The project will be implemented in ten countries.

CoESL and its partners will join with Scotiabank to host a national GEW breakfast highlighting entrepreneurs in each country, and their contribution to social and economic sustainable development, nationally and regionally. The project will also entail a series of business mentorship sessions throughout the year to assist and guide young entrepreneurs on how to grow their business.

Marcia Brandon of CoESL spoke to the importance of the initiative.

“Especially now in these stark economic times, to be the change we want to see, we must work together [as]regional private sector, public sector and civil society organizations to bring about that change. It will take strategic development work and intricate partnerships, but it can be done.

“Civil society organizations have the people development know-how, private sector has the financial and hard commercial skills and governments have the policy frameworks. If we all work at this together, genuinely and in sync, we will reap significant, cross–sectoral, multifaceted results. However this will not happen overnight; neither will it happen with one company or one person. Together we can go far in the Caribbean, “   she said.

Scotiabank’s regional director of marketing Heather Goldson said the bank was pleased to be the lead partner of this project and is committed to assisting CoESL in providing avenues to develop young entrepreneurs throughout the region.

“We wholeheartedly support CoESL’s mandate to create economic development through our young entrepreneurs who in future become our small business owners,” she said.

The ten Caribbean partners are GARD Center (Antigua & Barbuda), CoESL ( Barbados), The Organization for Rural Development, Entrepreneurship of Women & Youth (St Lucia), Constructive Solutions Inc. (St Vincent & the Grenadines), Institute of Sustainable Livelihood Leadership & Exchange (Belize), Business Builders Immersion (Bahamas), Entrepreneurs for Sustainable Economic Development Limited (Jamaica), Dynamic Youths of Grenada, Enabling Enterprise ( Trinidad & Tobago) and Beyond Timeless (St Kitts & Nevis).

The GEW Caribbean launch is tentatively scheduled for November 14, 2014.

For more on this story go to: http://www.nationnews.com/nationnews/news/58961/spotlight-sustainable-development-entrepreneurship#sthash.e3lUFyws.dpuf