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Recent Projects
Introduction from "Rich
in Resources: Women in Community Economic Development"
ACTEW’s interest in Community Economic Development
came out of a strategic planning exercise with ACTEW member
programs in 1993. Programs asked for information and training
resources in the area of women and community economic development.
Finding there was very little material in this area, ACTEW
applied for grants to support research and the development
of materials about women and community economic development
initiatives.
This resource kit is the result of a project generously
sponsored by Levi Strauss Inc. of Canada, the Ontario Women’s
Directorate, Status of Women Canada and Multiculturalism
and Citizenship Canada. The kit has four sections: Principles
for working in community economic development with women
and characteristics of successful initiatives; Case Studies
demonstrating how the principles are applied; Resources;
and a Training Module. The case studies include a "violence-free
zone" housing co-operative, a sewing collective, a
travel agency, and a women’s centre in Vancouver.
The kit is intended to be used by women’s community
based training programs, and any woman or community group
looking for information on community economic development.
ACTEW gratefully acknowledges the support and help of each
of the sponsors.
ACTEW is a provincial umbrella group representing over
4,000 women acros Ontario in pre-employment training programs.
Our members are the agencies and organizations delivering
training and employment services to women. ACTEW is mandated
to take up the issues faced by member organizations and
by the women who are learners in the prgrams. ACTEW distributes
information regarding training and labour force development
policy, advocates for women’s access to qulaity training,
consults with various levels of government, and networks
among and between women’s groups and training/education
providers.
Principles for Successful CED
Initiatives
- Diversity and Inclusivity: acknowledging that there
are differences in CED approaches; groups work in various
ways, and it is important to appreciate the differences
as well as the similarities; learning how to work across
diversities.
- Multiple Bottom Lines: recognizing that members of
a project each contribute to different degrees but all
in equal value.
- Collective Resources: developing collective resources
such as pooling funds and community marketing, is an integral
part of capacity building.
- Networking/ Support: establishing support groups both
business and social, identifying and learning about local
and community resources
- Sustainability and Capacity Building: thinking in the
long term; making sure that what is initiated can be maintained.
- Coping with the Tension Between Competition and Cooperation:
developing ways to address conflicting interests and different
goals and recognizing the value of compromise.
- Redefining Productivity: valuing unpaid labour such
as the work of caring for children, the elderly and the
home.
- Working for Social Justice: recognizing that support
for social justice is an integral part of this work although
tensions between viability and social justice may arise.
- Fluidity: allowing for different levels of contribution
to the CED group at different times; could depend on seasonal,
or social reasons; recognizing that equity is not equality
- Globalization/Sense of Shared Destiny: recognizing
that individual and community destinies are interdependent;
what happens locally affects what happens globally and
vice-versa.
Characteristics of a Successful
CED Initiative
- Policies of affirmative action/equity to ensure that
Women of Colour and First Nations women join the co-op,
collective, organization are embedded in the project.
- Altered definitions of productivity and bottom lines
which are not only concerned with financial aspects of
production but include social and environmental aspects
as important considerations as well.
- There is provision made for profit sharing, equity
and/or equality within the organization or the project.
- There is an understanding to accommodate individual
and diverse needs such as integrated child care programs,
elder or dependent care, and flexible timing.
- Collective mutual trust and the pooling of resources
such as sharing skills, child care and transportation
are crucial features.
CED RESOURCE GUIDE
Internet and Conferences
- United Nation's Conference on the Environment and Development
(UNCED), Action Agenda 21. This is the product of a four
day workshop and calls for national governments to include
women and representatives of indigenous peoples and grassroots
organizations in their delegations.
- Articles relating to women and sustainable development
including: . Equal input for women in the formulation
of policies that will affect the future of our planet
in the next century, report to UNCED Hearing, Seattle,
WA, Nov. 23, 1991 . UNCED and PROWWESS/UNDP initiatives
to empower women, initiate sanitation projects, socioeconomic
solutions, and specific actions agenda 21. PROWESSS/UNDP
is the only worldwide program specifically aimed at developing
functional models for involving local women in sustainable,
effectively used and environmentally sound drinking water
supply and sanitation projects.
- Articles on women and community economic development
with a specific Ontario focus: - Thinking About CED Beyond
the NDP, which discusses governmental barriers such as
policies that support big business and low minimum wages
and offers a CED definition ("embodies a diverse
range of approaches and strategies which...should be configured
to suit the unique needs of each community")
Books and Articles Available on CD ROM, Government Documents,
Canadian Business and Urban Affairs, Recent Books
- Making Communities Work: Women and CED by Lucy Alderson
and Melainie Conn in Community Economic Development In
Canada by Douglas, David J.A. The section includes a number
of case studies cited in this kit.
- Dobson, Ross V.G. Bringing The Economy Home From The
Market, defines CED as recreating local economies to ultimately
bring back community living, advocates a feminine model,
and stresses sustainability (continual productivity) in
order to perpetuate cycles of life. The book also discusses
the LETS monetary system (value of work traded instead
of money), and recalls the "good ol` days" in
London, Ontario in the 1930`s
Designing Housing For Women and Families, by Marnie Tamaki,
discusses the Entre Nous Femmes Housing Project.
- From The Bottom Up; The CED Approach, A Statement by
the Economic Council of Canada, Ministry of Supply and
Services Canada, 1990, discusses LDO's (Local Development
Organizations, their barriers, and the confusion of jurisdiction
between the 3 tiers of government, the need for public
support, and the need for government programs to be aware
of results. The document includes a chart on federal and
provincial support to business.
- Nozick, Marcia, No Place Like Home; Building Sustainable
Communities, book discusses sustainable communities, economic
self-reliance, community control over resources, ecological
development. The book includes a number of case studies.
- O'Neill, Kelly M, Native Women and Micro-Enterprise,
Canadian Woman Studies, v. 15, winter 1994. The article
discusses Native women, the population of people that
have the least full-time positions.
- Canadian Women's Foundation's grants have assissted
with start-up for business in micro-enterprise, and quilt
production. Results include changes in employment, self-esteem.
The article also discusses the fight against poverty in
the aboriginal community.
- Smith, Dorothy, Feminist Economics of Community Development,
The book discusses the emergence of 19 CDC's (Community
Development Coorporations).
- Meena, Ruth. Women and Sustainable Development, African
communities and their challenges with CED, discusses the
inability of women to influence policy-making, women are
marginalized and are absorbing most of the poverty.
- Shelia Rowthon, Bread and Dignity, dicusses women in
the international community.
- Making Waves, a quarterly publication which makes contact
with the community economic development practitioners
and policy-makers across Canada and abroad.
- Wismer, Susan and Karen Lior, Meeting Women's Training
Needs: Case Studies in Women's Training, Phase II Report,
Prepared for The Federal/Provincial/Territorial/Joint
Working Group of Status of Women and Labour Market Officials
on Education and Training, December 1994
- Roberts, Wayne, Get a Life! A Green Cure for Canada's
Economic Blues, Get A Life Publishing House, Toronto,
October 1994
- Alderson, Lucy and Conn, Melanie, Women Get Credit:
An Introductory Kit on Alternatiave Financing, WomenFutures
Community Economic Development Society, British Columbia,
1995. The kit contains specific and up-to-date information
on savings groups, lending circles, barter systems, loan
guarantee funds, and guidelines for initiating CED projects
in the community.
- Health Canada, Voices of Experience, CED Health Research
Project, distributed by Film Images, Canada, 1995. The
information contained in the video and manual contribute
to an evolving understanding of health and community economic
development. Toronto CED business models such as non-profit
and worker-owned, and the dynamics of business development
with people who have experienced long-term unemployment
are closely profiled. (43 minutes)
- Alderson, Lucy and Conn, Melanie, Counting Ourselves
In: A Women's Community Economic Development Handbook,
WomenFutures CED Society and Social Planning & Research
Council of British Columbia, July 1993. The handbook is
designed to be a guide for women seeking to start a CED
project. Many examples and practical strategies are laid
out in the form of workshop ideas and stories of centres,
loan circles, and small businesses. (82 pages)
- Community Economic Development Directory, Metro Community
Services, Social Services Division, 1992
People and Organizations with
Expertise in Community Economic Development
- Ontario Community Economic Development Alliance, (703-5351)
- WORLD WOMEN DESIGNERS, the three partners are Toulou
Rohani (705 474-2151), Susan Trenker (705-476-6721), Johanna
Bacaphone (705-472-8851) They are cited as a case study.
- The Canadian Women's Foundation, Bev Wybrow, Executive
Director (484-8268)
- Ontario Worker Co-ops Foundation, Peter Sullivan (462-9969)
- Ontario CED Alliance (703-2097)
- Self Employment Development Initiatives (SEDI), (504-8730),
Minerva Hui, Manager of Research and Communications
- Our Local Economy (OLE), Erwin Jimenez (361-5814) Initiated
in 1992, to be a project and organization.
- CED Projects in Metropolitan Toronto: Crafty Sisters,
Sistering, 523 College Street, Toronto, Ontario, M6G 1A8,
(416) 926-9762, Fax: (416) 926-1932. Inch By Inch, Woodworking
Collective, Dixon Hall Shelter, 30 St. Lawrence St., Toronto,
ON M5A 3N1, mail c/o 58 Sumach St. Toronto, ON. M5A 3J7
Parkdale Parents Primary Prevention Project, St. Joseph’s
Women’s Health Centre, 30 The Queensway, M6R 1B5,
Tel. (416) 530-6318 Presents of Mind, 521 College Street,
Toronto, ON Ontario Coalition for Alternative Business
(formerly Consumer/Survivor Business Council), 794 Broadview
Avenue, Toronto, ON M4K 2P7, (416) 465-8518 The Greeting
Card Business, The Meeting Place, St. Christopher House,
201 Dufferin Street, Toronto, ON M6K 3H9 (416) 533-7260
Toronto Women’s CED Group, C/O 761 Queen Street
West, 3rd Floor, Toronto, ON, M6J 1G1, (416) 363-6736
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