DES MOINES, Iowa -- An investment of $1 million to improve Iowa’s development of microenterprises was announced Monday at the 2008 Community Philanthropy Academy sponsored by the Iowa State University Community Vitality Center (CVC).
The funding will be provided by the Northwest Area Foundation and Greater Des Moines Community Foundation. “This investment will support an Iowa Microenterprise Assistance Project (IMAP) that has three goals,” said Mark Edelman, CVC Director.
“The first goal is to establish a statewide microlending entity that addresses a gap in Iowa’s entrepreneurial financing system. The second goal is to identify and support four regional/multi-county microenteprise assistance projects to encourage training, technical assistance, coaching and mentoring for microentrepreneurs. The third goal is to create incentives that will encourage local community philanthropy institutions to develop entrepreneurial endowments and collaborative efforts to sustain the mciroenterprise initiatives in their region,” he said.
“This microenterprise initiative is supported by the Northwest Area Foundation to enhance opportunities for low and moderate income people as a strategy to reduce rural poverty,” Edelman added.
The gap in microlending finance for entrepreneurs was identified by a project steering committee composed of diverse interests from banking, economic development, nonprofit lending, value-added agriculture and entrepreneurial technical assistance providers after one and a half years of study. Creation of a statewide mirolending entity also was more recently included as a recommendation from a microenterprise summit organized by consultants for the Iowa Department of Economic Development in December.
Edelman indicated that board members are being identified and the organizational meeting for the microlending entity is being planned for March. The pilot projects will be identified and organized during the coming year with implementation occurring during 2009 and 2010.
For more information see: www.cvcia.org .
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