New Ventures Mexico

I started working for New Ventures Mexico a couple of weeks ago and I thought it was time to quickly present what they're doing, the projects I'm involved in and to spread a little link-love for their website and blog (here are two of my posts).

New Ventures
New Ventures promotes sustainable growth in emerging markets by accelerating the transfer of capital to businesses that deliver social and environmental benefits at the base of the economic pyramid (source).



It's a 5 country (Brazil, Mexico, China, India, Indonesia) initiative by the Markets and Enterprise program of the World Resources Institute. We select SMEs ("the missing middle") in fast growing sectors (e.g. ecotourism, renewable energy, clean tech) in emerging markets and support them to scale their businesses by providing access to capital, consulting services, a network of entrepreneurs and a media platform.

New Ventures Mexico
is operating in several different areas. They provide Incubator (helping entrepreneurs in the idea stage) and Business Accelerator (proven businessess wanting to scale their operations) services and this is also the area where I'm working in. Additionally they advise companies on GRI and CSR and will shortly launch the first sustainable products and services directory (Las Páginas Verdes).

My Projects
I've been developing a set of socioeconomic and environmental indicators to be able to measure the positive impact of our portfolio companies more precisely.

Last week I started working on a pilot scheme to help save the Vaquita Marina, an endangered cetacean (whales and dolphins) species that lives in the North of the Gulf of California. Estimates are that there are only 200-600 specimen left and with the current rate of 40-80 dying a year, it could be the first cetacean to disappear due to human activities. The largest cause of mortality is that it is trapped in gill nets used to fishing sharks, spanish mackerel and other species. New Ventures Mexico will be responsible for advising on the economic transformation and supported by several other NGOs and the Mexican government in other areas.



I'm really happy that I chose to come here. My work's interesting (and I can apply my knowledge and efforts in one of my areas of interest: the Bottom of the Pyramid theory), the team is awesome and it's an interesting new experience working for a NGO and in Mexico.

Links:
- Vaquita Marina
- San Felipe
- New Ventures Mexico

Images:
- Vaquita Marina habitat: VaquitaMarina.org
- New Ventures: NewVentures.org