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We need jobs that produce, at a
minimum, the goods and services required to fulfil everyone’s
basic needs.
Jobs that regenerate, rather than destroy, the environment and
its resources. Because of the contribution they can make to
economic efficiency, social equity and environmental quality,
such jobs are today called sustainable
livelihoods – best
created by very small, local coefficient businesses: sustainable
micro-enterprises
Sustainable livelihoods are
particularly suited to the needs of women, the poor and the
marginalised. By providing people with income and some degree of
financial security, they are an excellent means of empowering
people within their communities.
In small and mini plants, the scarce capital is recovered in a
much shorter time, making it possible to reinvest it in further
production and job creation.
Sustainable micro-enterprises are usually quite small. They have
between 10 to 100 employees, with an average around 20. They are
generally informal and flexible and quite labour intensive.
However, being small, dispersed and largely unregulated, mini
enterprises can often have environmental and social impacts that
are fairly negative. To overcome this, they need access to
better technologies as well as other supports.
Such enterprises can create, directly, several workplaces, each
at an almost minimal capital investment . In addition,
they indirectly lead to the creation of several more jobs,
upstream and/or downstream, usually at an even lower capital cost.
At the same time, they permit very high returns on investment,
sometimes with payback periods of less than a year.
At Development Alternatives our credo is,
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Resource Regeneration
Sustainable Resource Utilisation
Maximization of inputs to local economy
……..to
provide sustainable livelihood options to the largest numbers.
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