LiderES Announces Prize Winners

For complete coverage in English of the LiderES prize, please click here

The Leadership in Sustainable Entrepreneurship Award (Premio LiderES), Nicaragua’s first prize of its kind, held its inaugural dinner on June 3rd in an event that brought together Nicaragua’s top businesses and entrepreneurship supporters to celebrate the social and environmental impact of responsible businesses.

Wednesday’s event began with an open conversation among small business and economic development experts about the benefits of corporate social responsibility among small and growing businesses.  Agora Partnerships’ Ricardo Teran moderated the forum that featured Americo Herrera of Germany’s development program (DED), Edgar Bermudez of AVINA, and Miguel Mendez of Holland’s development program (SNV).

The Premio LiderES ceremony culminated with $10,000 awards in two categories—social impact and business leadership. The Social Impact Award went to Paulo Reyes of Agro Eco Services for his company’s work in producing organic fertilizer, organic pesticides, and pro-biotics for livestock. The Business Leadership Award went to Dominique Ruegsegger of Finca Santa Clara, which makes gourmet marmalades and jams from produce sourced from local farmers and individual families throughout the region. The businesses were judged on the sustainability and scalability of their business model, social and environmental impact of their products and practices, as well as the leadership role they have taken in the community. While this year’s competition was focused on companies operating in Nicaragua, in the coming year we will launch Premio LiderES across Central America.

On behalf of LiderES, we would like to thank all of our sponsors, AVINA, Citi Foundation, DED, DHL, Ola Verde, SNV, and uniRSE, as well as all of the great entrepreneurs dedicated to making an impact with their businesses.

Launch of Premio LiderES

Agora Partnerships, in collaboration with Citi Foundation, uniRSE, DED, SNV and Avina, launched on February 11th the first competition to celebrate Small Business Sustainable Entrepreneurship in Latin America, the "Premio LiderES".

The competition is currently focused in Nicaragua with plans to expand regionally in 2010.

The main objective of LiderES is to celebrate small and medium enterprises that deliver superior social performance, such as creating jobs, providing goods and services that serve low-income populations, working with low-income suppliers and distributors, implementing model labor practices, fighting climate change, and leading society by example. The organizations behind LiderES believe it is time to recognize those small business entrepreneurs who have created a discernable positive impact on their community through their business and community leadership. We hope through this competition to shine a light on individuals who are addressing society’s problems through their businesses. In addition, we hope to increase society’s appreciation of the fundamental role entrepreneurs play in fighting poverty and inequality in low income countries.

LiderES is grateful to the Citi Foundation for providing the majority of funding to make the LiderES prize possible.

The Competition is composed of 2 prizes:

 - Liderazgo Empresarial / Entrepreneurial leadership

The goal is to celebrate small and medium enterprises that have been able to significantly grow their businesses, while providing social value to all stakeholders.

- Impacto Social Empresarial / Entrepreneurial Social Impact

 The goal is to support small and medium enterprises that have implemented innovative social impact projects and are looking to expand them.

For each Prize, the winner will be awarded:

-  $10,000
- The opportunity to get a $5,000 incentive from the DED’s Public-Private Partnership (PPP) program to implement their social impact initiative.
- Strategic consulting from Agora Partnerships
- A class on Social Responsibility given by the Nicaraguan Union for Corporate Social Responsibility, uniRSE
- A video showcasing the company

Second and third place will win:

- Strategic consulting from Agora Partnerships
- A class on Social Responsibility given by uniRSE
- A video showcasing the company
- A recognition plaque