It seemed fitting that the first speaker at the first-ever Global Entrepreneurship Day in Haiti was Mathias Pierre, who rose from the ranks of the poor to launch a successful information technology business.

“Entrepreneurship is the antidote to poverty,” Pierre said in an introductory speech to the 60 business students from 10 Haitian universities that participated in the event. “It solves poverty, and when poverty is solved, solutions to all other problems follow.”

Max Chauvet, whose newspaper Le Nouvelliste would borrow Pierre’s inspired words for its headline story about the historic event the next day, reminded the students: “It is not the size of your business, but the size of your vision, that matters.”

Pierre André Dunbar, Director-General of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry went even further, urging on the young entrepreneurs: “Don’t rest in theory—transform into action!”

The trio joined economist Lesly Jules of the Leadership Center and entrepreneurs Roberts Waddle, founder of the JOBPAW website, in a panel discussion on the challenges and potential of entrepreneurship in Haiti, followed by questions and answers from students. The afternoon was devoted to workshops for participating schools to come up with ideas for successful businesses that could overcome the challenges outlined by the panel.

Participating institutions were the Centre Universitaire Maurice Laroche, Centre de Technologies Moderne d’Haiti, Centre de Formation Professionnelle d’Haiti, Centre Management et de Productivité, Ecole de Commerce Julien Craan, Haiti Tec, Institut des Hautes Etudes Commerciales et Economiques, Institut National de Gestion et des Hautes Etudes Internationales, Infotronique, and Université Quisqueya (left). In addition, young entrepreneurs from Fondation ETRE talked about their recent entrepreneurship workshop in Montreal.

In his welcoming remarks, PDT Country Director Salim Loxley—joined by First Secretary (Development) Stephanie VanWestarp from the Embassy of Canada, which cosponsored the event—urged the students to “share ideas and then turn those ideas into action.”

The presentations by the universities bore witness to the potential of that counsel: the ideas and ventures cut across Haitian sectors and industries and ranged from strengthening agriculture to increasing tourism to propelling technological innovations. The winning presentation—“Zanmman Lakay,” or Almonds of Haiti, by Université Quisqueya—focused on developing Haiti’s under-utilized almond industry through agricultural improvements and by developing innovative products such as almond butter with export potential. The photo above shows Quisqueya students celebrating when the award was announced by a panel of judges from PDT and the Embassy of Canada.

The event, at the Karibe Hotel in Port-au-Prince, marked Haiti’s participation in Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) which started in 2004 at the initiative of former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. More than 100 countries now host GEW events annually. The main point of contact for the GEW worldwide is the Kauffman Foundation, with PDT serving as the partner organization in Haiti.

.....................................
Ivy Kuperberg contributed to this article. Photographs by Sebastien Dossous.

tags: Centre de Formation Professionnelle d’Haiti, Centre de Technologies Moderne d’Haiti, Centre Management et de Productivité, Centre Universitaire Maurice Laroche, Ecole de Commerce Julien Craan, GEW Haiti, Haiti Tec, Infotronique, Institut des Hautes Etudes Commerciales et Economiques, Institut National de Gestion et des Hautes Etudes Internationales, Université Quisqueya