Last year OPIC, in cooperation with the Department of State, agreed to provide $150 million to support winning projects in two 2012 business proposal competitions to be conducted in 2012 by State’s new International Diaspora Engagement Alliance (IdEA). One of those competitions, the Caribbean IdEA Marketplace, launched on March 1, 2012.
OPIC will provide $50 million to support the Caribbean IdEA Marketplace, a structured business competition designed to foster collaboration on innovative projects linking Caribbean diaspora entrepreneurs and their countries of origin. (The second competition, the Latino American IdEA Partnership (La Idea) will receive $100 million in OPIC support for a similar competition that aims to help Hispanic migrants in the United States to implement creative new social and business ideas addressing issues of economic growth, food, security, water, and climate change in Latin America.) Winners will have access to technical assistance, capacity-building advice, and a wide range of financial instruments including capital investment, OPIC and commercial loans, and OPIC political risk insurance.
OPIC Executive Vice President Mimi Alemayehou attended the March 1 launch in Montego Bay, Jamaica.
From left to right: Michael Thompson, Senior Vice President, Corporate and Commercial Banking, Scotiabank Jamaica; Melissa Martinez-Nadal, Caribbean Idea Marketplace Coordinator; Jose Jorge Saavedra, Executive Director of Compete Caribbean; The Honourable Portia Simpson Miller; Mr. Steven J. Puig, Vice President for the Private Sector & Non-Sovereign Guaranteed Operations, Inter-American Development Bank (IDB); Marie T. Legault, Counsellor and Head, Development Cooperation, Canadian International Development Agency-Jamaica Office; Mimi Alemayehou, Executive Vice President, Overseas Private Investment Corporation; Graham Glover, United Kingdom’s Deputy High Commissioner to Jamaica; Mark Linehan, Chief Executive Officer, Digicel Jamaica and Ambassador Pamela Bridgewater, U.S. Ambassador to Jamaica; Mr. Kris Balderston, U.S. Secretary of State’s Special Representative for Global Partnerships.
