Succeeding together

Furthering an entrepreneurial climate for the Philippines is what the Philippine Center for Entrepreneurship-Go Negosyo has been doing for the past eight years. The past year, 2013, was full of challenges and achievements for us. Before we know it, we will be entering a new chapter that will again challenge us.

#Throwbacking (as many of us would tag it on social media sites) on the events that happened this year, I am confident in saying that Go Negosyo was successful in mounting big summits, educational caravans and seminars, bridging strong partnerships here and abroad, and recognizing excellent work in entrepreneurship.

We started with the 2nd Technopreneurship Summit in January and the 5th Filipina Entrepreneurship Summit in March. Our vision is to have more of these and reach out to the majority of the population, especially the youth. So we launched the Youth Entrepreneur Summit (YES) in Baguio in July, which was attended by more than 3,000 students, followed by the YES Visayas in September. We also had partnership projects and caravans with DTI across the country and the NEGOSEMs that taught aspiring and already entrepreneurs the basics of business.

We partnered with the British Embassy in launching the Global Entrepreneurship Week Philippines in October. Then we had the Entrepreneurship Creativity and Innovation Summit in November, which was attended by nearly 6,000 participants. Following it was the Villar SIPAG’s OFW and Family Summit attended by over a thousand OFWs with their families at the World Trade Center.

Through the years, we had the Ernst and Young Awards and MVP Bossing awards to recognize outstanding medium to large enterprises. We also hold the Citi-Microentrepreneurship Awards and the Sustainable Income for People in the Agrarian Grassroots (SIPAG) Awards to honor exemplary works from micro and small enterprises.

After all these events, one thing that will surely boost all our efforts of educating Filipinos about the value of entrepreneurship is the filing and sponsorship of the Go Negosyo Bill of Sen. Bam Aquino last Dec. 17. This is a great way to start for us entrepreneurs for it will surely help reduce the poverty rate by empowering micro and small enterprises to level up and succeed in business, just like what we in Go Negosyo have been advocating.

Truly, we have helped others to achieve greater heights in advancing an enterprising climate in our country. Your success is our success.