For my last post, I would like to share a rather new development in the Social Enterprise (SE) sector in Singapore.
Lead by Social Enterprise Association, Singapore Totalisator Board which runs the Social Enterprise Hub, Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) and National Council of Social Service(NCSS), the unnamed center would be a one-stop location for social enterprises to seek help.(Goy, 2015)
The center will provide mentorship opportunities, services such as funding, networking and consultancy. (Goy, 2015)
NCSS will be setting up partnership with its 400 voluntary welfare organizations (VWOs) and social enterprises.(Goy, 2015)
More details and the exact center location will be revealed later this year.(Goy, 2015)
This is a piece of good news for all social enterprises! Currently, social enterprises have to go to different agencies to seek help. It will help them to save time and resources to seek aid if all applications and services are available at one place.
It can become a win-win situation. SEs can leverage on these partnerships to find out more about their beneficiaries needs and if the SEs are meeting their needs. SEs can also explore other opportunities to help the VWOs as well. VWOs can engage the SEs to be part of their organization or help to develop their sustainable business model.
Social Enterprises are able to focus more on their operations and worry less about spending lots of time seeking additional help.
In the article, Minister of Social and Family Development, Mr Chan Chun Sing had expressed that if there are more social enterprises in Singapore, Singapore is able to do more good for the disadvantaged groups in a sustainable way.(Goy, 2015)
This shows a promising sign that the government does view social enterprise positively and are willing to give more support to social enterprises.Social Enterprises should continue to keep up it's good reputation, be ethical and social impact. For now, I can say that the future for SEs in Singapore is rather promising! I cannot wait to see the future developments of Singapore's SE sector!^^
Cheers,
Angel:)
References
Goy, P. (2015). New one-stop resource centre for social enterprises to be launched.Straitstimes.com. Retrieved 6 February 2015, from http://www.straitstimes.com/news/singapore/more-singapore-stories/story/new-one-stop-resource-centre-social-enterprises-be-launc
