I have learned that I grow together with the team throughout the RISE. There are always new things to do and things to learn from the RISE and the Risers itself, which have shaped me and will definitely help me in the future.
What is Balkan Green Foundation?
We are Balkan Green Foundation, the local incubator from Kosovo. We are an NGO working in the field of energy, environment and sustainable development domain. We are active since 2014 while as a Local Incubator since the beginning of RISE in May 2020. BGF journey with entrepreneurship has started in 2016 with the Philanthropy for Green Ideas (now Balkan Green Ideas) which is a program that supports the development of local and sustainable small green ideas in the Balkans. The Balkan Green Ideas has had 10 editions and is a program that supports the Sustainable Development Goals. In total we have supported 4 businesses from RISE and 36 from BGI making the number of the entrepreneurs more than 100.
How do you and your local incubator contribute to raising awareness of the importance of social entrepreneurship?
We are very active in participating in different forums, workshops and conferences where we promote the social entrepreneurship but at the same time through our website and social medias. I personally like the share my experience in RISE and promote the ideas we have supported in order to raise the number of people that are aware of RISE opportunities and to encourage others to come up with new ideas a apply to become a RISER. Further, we have seen that social media is a great platform of reaching people by showing our RISE engagements, activities and promote the winners.
How are you helping young entrepreneurs in their project?
I help the young entrepreneurs by serving as a bridge for RISERS for the communication and instructions between the consortium and the LIs and at the same time help and guide them through capacity building, business development and pitching of their ideas to RISE team but also other donor in the future. Further, I help them with tasks assigned to them after the winner teams are selected and guide them through the process until they join the market.