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U.S. Joins International Public-Private Development Partnership

The SEED Initiative

The United States has jointed an international public-private partnership to aid entrepreneurs in poor countries develop local poverty-reduction strategies.

The Supporting Entrepreneurs for Environment and Development (SeeD) initiative, announced at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development, will link large and small entrepreneurs from all parts of the world to help communities in developing countries improve the quality of their citizens' lives, according to a September 7 State Department statement.

SEED will support the internationally agreed development goals adopted at the United Nations in 2002. The partnership of governments, international organizations and civil society groups will announce the first 10 partnership finalists selected for a biannual award in October and the five award winners in April 2005, according to the statement.

The selected partnerships will be featured online at: http://www.seedinit.org.

Following is the text of State's statement:

Department of State
Office of the Spokesman
September 7, 2004

UNITED STATES JOINS SEED INITIATIVE

Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky announced today that the United States was joining the Supporting Entrepreneurs for Environment and Development (Seed) Initiative. The Seed Initiative, a voluntary public-private partnership, encourages local partnerships by assisting new development solutions to community challenges. "Partnerships, such as Seed, are vital to helping local communities improve the quality of their citizens' lives and can make an important contribution to the world community's efforts to achieve development goals," stated Under Secretary Dobriansky.

Seed, originally announced at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development, will link large and small entrepreneurs from all parts of the world to build local ability to support the outcomes from the World Summit on Sustainable Development and internationally agreed goals contained in the Millennium Declaration.

The partnership has three objectives:

-- To recognize innovative, promising approaches through a biennial award program. Seed honorees will receive support services based on their partnership's goals.

-- To showcase the selected partnerships on the Internet at www.seedinit.org.

-- To provide a lessons-learned and best practice resource for other partnerships. This information will also be available on the Internet. In addition to highlighting the selected partnerships, this lessons-learned resource will include a wide variety of support information and lessons learned from other development partnerships.

Seed will announce its first ten finalists for the biennial award in October. In November, during the 3rd IUCN [World Conservation Union] World Conservation Congress in Bangkok, Seed finalists will participate in workshops and gain insights on how to implement their initiatives. Seed will announce its top five inaugural award winners at the next session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development in April 2005.

Seed partners include international organizations (IUCN-World Conservation Union, United Nations Environment Program, United Nations Development Program), civil society organizations (Global Public Policy Institute, Centre for the Advancement of Sustainable Development Partnerships), other partnerships (Global Compact), and governments (Germany, Italy, and Norway).