Young Entrepreneurs Sri Lanka (YESL) — the country’s host for Global Entrepreneurship Week — was recently profiled in the Daily Financial Times, the English-language daily associated with the most important newspapers in the country. The profile followed a YESL press conference to announce their plans for GEW 2010.
“Special emphasis has been placed on five million students who the government will find it hard to provide jobs for unless they are empowered to form their own companies and provide employment for others. This more than anything else is our focus, to ensure that we can tap into and develop the human resource potential Sri Lanka is rich with,” said (YESL President Deshbandu Patrick) Amerasinghe.
The main events planned include, national reconciliation through entrepreneur education in schools and universities, fellowship programmes with a view to build better relationships between business community, students and other potential entrepreneurs.
“We also plan to have events on entrepreneurship in universities and schools countrywide. The main event will be the Biz Challenge; a competition where the youth can send in their business ideas and win an attractive package of benefits after the completion of a series of leadership activities.”
Even corporates can participate through the corporate challenge, which will be a competition held to encourage employees to contribute to the development of their organisation. A workshop on “How to Start a Business” is free of charge to anyone with an entrepreneurial spirit and the determination to be their own boss.
There is also an awards ceremony to reward all those who participate in GEW 2010.
“Most of the children that we assist in developing entrepreneurial skills are from low income backgrounds both within and outside Colombo. We are gravely in need of sponsorships and partners from the corporate sector to take this programme to the rural areas and work with schools, particularly teenagers who are part of the high school level. It is a very worthy cause and we hope that by showing their support for the GEW week more and more entrepreneurs will be born in Sri Lanka.”
(Source: ft.lk)