NGO wins grant from former eBay head
By Jerome Aning
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 04:50:00 04/25/2008
A Quezon City-based nongovernmental organization is one of the recipients of an award for pioneering social entrepreneurship given by the Skoll Foundation of billionaire Jeffrey Skoll, former president of the Internet auction firm eBay and an independent movie producer.
The Visayan Forum Foundation Inc., founded by human rights activist Maria Cecilia Flores Oebanda, is among the four Skoll awardees from Asia that will be joining the growing global network of Skoll social entrepreneurs, now numbering 59. It is cited for creating innovative and proven solutions for tackling the world’s most urgent social and economic challenges.
As a child in the Philippines, Oebanda helped her family survive by selling fish and scavenging garbage. As freedom fighters against the Marcos dictatorship, she and her husband were imprisoned for four years and separated from their oldest son. Their two other children were born in detention.
After the return of democracy, Oebanda founded VFFI in 1991 to eliminate human trafficking through public-private partnerships that rescue, protect and reintegrate victims.
The NGO has served 18,500 victims and potential victims to date and has filed 66 legal cases on behalf of 166 complainants. By 2011, VFFI plans to expand its multi-sectoral networks and expand its program against human trafficking.
The awards were presented by Jeffrey Skoll and special guest, former United States President Jimmy Carter during the recent 5th annual Skoll World Forum on Social Entrepreneurship at the Saïd Business School, University of Oxford in England.
The Skoll World Forum convenes a global community of outstanding practitioners and thought leaders in social entrepreneurship attracting more than 750 delegates from more than 35 countries.
The forum aims to set the future agenda for visionaries who want to transform society. Participants include social entrepreneurs, thought leaders, policymakers, corporate representatives, financiers, philanthropists and students.
VFFI and other 10 other organizations receiving the awards will each receive $1-million grants. The other awardees were Amazon Conservation Team (based in Arlington, Virginia), American Council on Renewable Energy (Washington DC), Arzu (Chicago), Digital Divide Data (Phnom Penh, Cambodia), Half the Sky Foundation (Beijing, China), KIVA (San Franciso, California), mothers2mothers (Cape Town, South Africa), Partners in Health, PeaceWorks Foundation (New York), and the Population and Community Development Association (Bangkok, Thailand).
The Skoll Foundation website (http://www.skollfoundation.org) defines a social entrepreneur as “change agent for society, seizing opportunities others miss by improving systems, inventing new approaches and creating sustainable solutions to change society for the better.”
Unlike business entrepreneurs who are motivated by profits, social entrepreneurs are motivated to improve society. Despite this difference, social entrepreneurs are just as innovative and change oriented as their business counterparts, searching for new and better ways to solve the problems that plague society.
In a statement from the foundation’s headquarters in Palo Alto, California, Skoll Foundation president and CEO Sally Osberg praised this VFFI and other awardees this year for representing being tireless in tackling issues that require the most immediate attention.
“We know solutions exist around the world that have transformed millions of lives, in a sustainable way, across education, health, environmental and other social systems,” Osberg said. “And most importantly, the models they have developed have the potential for vastly increased impact.”
Skoll, 43, a Canadian-born businessman who lives in Los Angeles, California, used his wealth to become a philanthropist and to found the independent movie production company Participant Productions, which promotes social values in films.
Participant Productions produced such movies as “Syriana,” “Good Night and Good Luck,” “Charlie Wilson’s War” and “An Inconvenient Truth”—the last won two Oscars in 2007—and is credited for extending the public debate over climate change.
Skoll Foundation makes grants in excess of $30 million per year. Skoll’s largest charitable donation was a $7.5-million endowment for the first Canadian dual degree program for gifted students who wanted to obtain a bachelors degree in Engineering and an MBA in a special program of six years and eight months at the University of Toronto.
He has also funded the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship, at Saïd Business School, Oxford University, which undertakes research in social entrepreneurship, coordinates the Skoll World Forum and provides scholarships for the Oxford MBA program to five young social entrepreneurs.
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