EPTISA project Support to Social Enterprises has its focus on the development of social entrepreneurship in Macedonia and eco system like legislation for the SE, support centres for SEs and capacity building, financial instruments for SEs, promotion and recognition of SEs. Developing a favourable eco-system with a tailor-made National Strategy / Action Plan and the legislation on social entrepreneurship is the most crucial groundwork that will create preconditions for future social enterprises development.
Parallel to the legislation for social entrepreneurship development, municipalities, companies, civic society, social service providers, youth, individuals, and the wider public need to be prepared, informed, and motivated to support social entrepreneurship initiatives on the local level.
Equally important within the project is developing cooperation on the regional and EU level – for this reason, the project has fostered several international initiatives that all play a contributing role and create synergies between Macedonia and its partner countries in the region. Below is a brief description of several international initiatives that are envisaged to exchange good practices on social entrepreneurship, update each other on the strategies and legislation latest development, funding resources, loans, and the improvement of the work of local structures when embedding the social entrepreneurship concept on the local levels.
Visegrad Fund follow-up project – in 2019-2020 period, Poland, Macedonia, Hungary, and Czech Republic were international partners on the topic of social entrepreneurship within the project„Social Economies without Borders” which was successfully completed and has inspired municipalities, civic society, and companies to work together.
As a natural progression and development of this cooperation, another follow-upinternational collaboration initiative called Building International Bridges – Social Entrepreneurship as a Tool for Local Economic Empowerment was created, to be implemented from April 2022-March 2023.
The follow-up project will further deepen the prior established international exchanges to inspire social impact regarding the legislation, financial support and shaping public opinion. The project will: • foster international good practices exchange/networking on social inclusion/entrepreneurship • use international practices to stimulate national/local authorities, companies, and social enterprises to use social entrepreneurship as a tool for socio-economic empowerment of marginalized groups.
The international partners in this follow-up project come from Poland, Macedonia, Hungary, Czech Republic, and Slovakia, as a new partner that will contribute with their knowledge on social entrepreneurship good practices.
Regional cooperation Serbia – Macedonia – was a result of the local project cooperation between the EPTISA National Centre for social enterprises, Social Integration & Empowerment Centre / SIEC, and the Aerodrom municipality who found a common ground to connect the civic society and municipalities in terms of solving community development issues via social entrepreneurship.
Municipality of Palilula, Nis, Serbia and the civic society partners Proactiv and the Roma Cultural Centre were visited on several occasions and have exchanged good practices and ideas for potential development of social entrepreneurship, which resulted in signing the regional Memorandum of cooperation in November 2021, with 6 associate NGO partners from Macedonia (ARNO, SOLEM, SIEC, MISLA, LJUBEZNOST, AHP PRILEP).
The established contact was continued through a series of meetings which produced an ambitious ERASMUS PLUS project application that should bring Poland, Macedonia, Serbia and Italy together to learn from each other on social cooperatives, deinstitutionalization, trainings and workshops for regional support centres for social entrepreneurship, job shadowing for municipalities and regional centres etc.
If approved, the Partnership for Economy of Solidarity project should provide knowledge on the legislation on SE in each country, financial instruments for social enterprises, support structures (in Poland Centers for SE, in Italy Consortia, in Macedonia piloting programs of the Regional Centers for SEs), it will additionally provide know-how regarding the access to the public markets and the public procurement procedures with reserved contracts. The comparison of the situation in each country will produce national recommendations to the relevant ministries and other institutions
The goal of the project is to empower support structures for developing social entrepreneurship in Macedonia and in Serbia and creating more favorable environment for development of social economy by exploring the context in each partners’ country with particular focus on the role of municipalities, support center and building of the ecosystem.
Erasmus Plus application for regional cooperation – regional and international partners from Macedonia, Poland and The Netherlands have submitted an additional Erasmus project on adult learning opportunities within the national Erasmus plus call.
The project called Transformative Adult Learning – CHANGEPRENEURSHIP was submitted to the National Agency for European Educational Programmes and Mobility in partnership between the following organizations: In Vivo from Skopje, in cooperation with Pro Local from Bitola, the Barka from The Netherlands and from Poland. The project should address the social exclusion of adults due to their economic and social disadvantage. Specifically, the target group of adults with difficult background, in all project related countries, North Macedonia, Poland and Netherlands is socially excluded due to their low skills, challenged economic survival and stigma by the society.
If approved, the project will be beneficial in terms of exchanging good practices, experiences, and knowledge on the community-based reintegration mechanisms for the vulnerable groups of citizens and it will be used for creating a community house for the homeless, addicted and former prisoners in Struga, where a social enterprise will be established to provide catering services for tourists travelling between Macedonia and Albania.
The project Support to Social Enterprises can thus boast with creating synergies between various international projects and with connecting several EU and regional partner countries such as Poland, Italy, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia and Macedonia aiming to contribute to raising awareness internationally on the importance of social entrepreneurship as a tool for socio-economic empowerment of local communities and their vulnerable groups.
In addition, the international collaboration projects will: develop and advance legislations, action plans and strategies, the work of municipalities and the SE/civic society, create local and regional partnerships with companies and find suitable financial tools for further development and support of social enterprises. They play an important role in inclusion of the vulnerable groups of people into society and build solidary local communities and better world.
