Jan 2010
Press contact: Donna Katzin, 646-442-0181, donna@sharedinterest.org
New York, NY. January 27, 2010. The Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) announced that it is making a $3 million investment guaranty facility available to Shared Interest, a not-for-profit U.S.-based social investment fund, to promote lending to primarily black-owned small businesses and microenterprises in South Africa. Shared Interest, which guarantees South African bank loans to impoverished entrepreneurs, will use the facility to expand its guaranty activities and attract additional capital from U.S. investors. This is a significant step towards helping Shared Interest meet its goal of increasing its portfolio of guaranties by 450 percent. “This facility will enable Shared Interest both to expand its lending to South African SMEs - an important engine of economic growth in the country — and draw additional capital from other investors: two multiplier effects that will greatly benefit South African small businesses,” said OPIC Acting President Dr. Lawrence Spinelli. “We at OPIC are extremely pleased to partner with Shared Interest, which has had such an instrumental effect in facilitating the provision of capital for South African SMEs.”
OPIC’s $3 million facility may be drawn down over a five-year period to cover potential losses on South African bank loans to poor entrepreneurs to whom they would otherwise be reluctant to lend. Shared Interest will be able to access the facility in the event that the organization exhausts its own guaranty loss reserve fund, which will enable the fund to grow to benefit thousands more South Africans. “OPIC’s facility will bolster the business of transformation,” commented Donna Katzin, Shared Interest’s executive director. “It will enable us to unlock millions more dollars of credit for struggling black-owned enterprises in South Africa.”
About Shared Interest: Shared Interest is a non-profit investment fund established 15 years ago to enable U.S. investors to participate in South Africa’s democratic and equitable reconstruction after apartheid. Shared Interest uses the funds it raises from investors to partially guarantee South African bank loans to entrepreneurs, microfinance institutions, and cooperatives in economically disenfranchised communities. It works with its South African partner, the Thembani International Guarantee Fund, to place, monitor and mitigate the risk of its guaranties – and to broaden the lending practices of South African banks. Since inception, the organization has helped its beneficiaries create more than 400,000 small and microenterprises, build and refurbish more than 100,000 low-cost homes, and obtain more than 1.6 million jobs. Not one of its investors has lost a penny of interest or principal.
About OPIC: OPIC was established as a U.S. government agency in 1971. It helps U.S. businesses invest overseas, fosters economic development in new and emerging markets, complements the private sector in managing risks associated with foreign direct investment, and supports U.S. foreign policy. OPIC’s political risk insurance and financing help U.S. businesses invest in more than 150 emerging markets and developing nations. Over the agency’s 38-year history, OPIC has supported $188 billion worth of investments that have helped developing countries to generate over 830,000 host-country jobs. OPIC projects have also generated $72 billion in U.S. exports and supported more than 273,000 American jobs.
Nov 2009
On March 22, 2010 Shared Interest will hold its 16th Anniversary Awards Dinner at Gotham Hall in New York City. For more information please call The JFM Group at 914-235-1490 extension 14 or email sharedinterest@thejfmgroup.com .
To purchase tickets for the event please click here.
Honorees
Dr. Peter Magubane, Documentary Photographer
The Nielsen Company, World Leader in Marketing and Media Information
Timothy Smith, Senior Vice President, Environment, Social Governance Group, Walden Asset Management.
Honorary Chairs
Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu
H.E. Ambassodor Baso Sangqu, South Africa
Next Decade Dinner Committee Co-Chairs
Jean Bond, Writer, Editor and Political Activist
Danny Glover, Actor
Vincent Mai, AEA Investors
Susan L. Taylor, Founder & CEO, National CARES Mentoring Movement
Sep 2009
Shared Interest is delighted to invite you to our upcoming
reception hosted by Board Member, Rev. Harold Lewis, featuring Father Michael Lapsley, founder of the Institute for Healing of Memories.
This event will take place on Sunday, October 4 at Calvary Episcopal Church, in Pittsburgh.
The Institute for the Healing of Memories is a Cape Town based nonprofit organization that supports and facilitates the spiritual and emotional reconciliation of South Africa’s citizens, and other trauma victims around the world. Through the institute’s weekend retreats, black and white South Africans join in transformative workshops, facilitated by Father Lapsley, that use art, dialogue and role play to help participants heal the psychological and interpersonal wounds inflicted during the apartheid era.
In conversation with Donna Katzin, Shared Interest’s Executive Director, the evening will explore South Africa’s path towards spiritual, emotional and economic reconciliation. We hope you can join us as we explore and celebrate South Africa, and learn from its continuing journey towards transformation and justice.
At the event, we will welcome suggested donations of $50 or more in support of Shared Interest and The Institute for Healing of Memories. We hope you will be able to join us.
Where:
Calvary Episcopal Church
315 Shady Avenue (on the corner of Walnut St.)
Pittsburgh, PA 15206
When:
Sunday, October 4, 2009 at 5 PM.
RSVP to:
Alicia Kingue (by September 28)
Director of External Relations
646-442-0186
alicia@sharedinterest.org
The Institute for Healing of Memories (IHOM) facilitates Healing of Memories workshops in response to the emotional, psychological and spiritual wounds that are inflicted on nations, communities and individuals by wars, repressive regimes, human rights abuses and other traumatic events or circumstances.
Jun 2009
Shared Interest 2008 Annual Report
This year, South Africa celebrates Youth Day, June 16, with new challenges, but also new optimism. As I write, the global financial crisis is taking its toll on young people’s job opportunities – and also their dreams. Families across the country struggle to feed, shelter and educate their children, and provide opportunities for them to thrive in a more equitable society.
The beneficiaries of Shared Interest’s guarantees – who now number more than 1.800,000 black South Africans — are also on the front lines. Across the country, they are grappling with food prices that soared last year. Construction costs, which climbed with the price of fuel, have not declined significantly. With rising unemployment, more youth are looking for jobs to contribute to their families’ income, and have to look harder. Banks are increasingly reluctant to lend, and require more encouragement and enhancements than they did the year before.
In this climate, Shared Interest and Thembani are working flat out – with no increase in staff – to unlock credit for small businesses, new homes and viable rural communities. We continue to streamline our operations and collaborate with other organizations to supply South African microfinance institutions, cooperatives and community enterprises with access to capital and technical assistance.
The hard-won results speak for themselves. On the front cover of our 2008 Annual Report, you will see a story that will not make the front page of tomorrow’s newspapers: Two former school principals, Phildah Modjadji and Salome Mondlane, display the Female Farmer of the Year award. They won the honor for their leadership of the fruit and vegetable growing and dehydration project, Diretsogetse, whose name was chosen by their former pupils — the community’s youth. It means “opportunities have come up for us.”
We invite you to celebrate the victories you have helped us win during 2008.
This year more than ever, we look forward to your continuing partnership and support. As Nelson Mandela reminds us:
Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is people who have made poverty and tolerated poverty, and it is people who will overcome it.
Donna Katzin
Executive Director
Shared Interest 2008 Annual Report
Feb 2009
Shared Interest is pleased to announce that H.E. Graça Machel, wife of Nelson Mandela and former First Lady of Mozambique, and Dr. Price Cobbs will be honored at the Awards Dinner for Shared Interest’s 15th Anniversary Gala.
Please click here to print a response form:
Awards Dinner Response Form
MONDAY, MARCH 30, 2009, TAVERN ON THE GREEN, NEW YORK CITY. BUY TICKETS or DONATE online at www.NYCharities.org . For more information contact Alicia Kingue at Tel:646-442-0186 email: alicia@sharedinterest.org.
RSS Feed