The Flightplan
People worldwide are facing serious problems such as poverty, disease and hunger. Many of those problems can be linked directly to a lack of economic opportunity.
Through the Microsoft Unlimited Potential (UP) program, the company is working in partnership with governments and community organizations around the world to create new economic opportunities for millions of people, by providing information and communications technology (ICT) skills training that enables them to transform their lives and enrich their communities.
By 2010, Microsoft and its partners will bring the benefits of ICT and technology skills training to a quarter billion people underserved by technology—skills that will provide the economic empowerment they need to build a new life for themselves and their families.
The Passengers
At Microsoft, we believe that by providing training and tools, and working closely with our partners, we can create social and economic opportunities that can help people realize their potential. It has been our privilege to touch the lives of millions of people around the world in this way, and we are working every day to do even more.
From Disability to Independence
Add Reyna Estela Ramos de Valenzuela to the list of IT entrepreneurs who have launched thriving businesses from a garage. Reyna, 56, is one of an estimated 50 million people in Latin America living with a disability. A nervous system disorder limits her mobility and has made it difficult for her to find employment. She once went seven years without a job. But these days, Reyna works for herself.
Residents of Guatemala City visit Reyna’s Cybercafé Compdiver when they want to go online or get help with printing, scanning, or graphic design. Reyna founded her business—in her garage—after she received technology and entrepreneurship training through the Partnership for Opportunities In Employment through Technology in the Americas, or POETA, a joint effort of Microsoft and Trust for the Americas, the nonprofit affiliate of the Organization of American States.
An estimated 80 to 90 percent of people living with disabilities in Latin America are unemployed. About 82 percent live below the poverty level, most without health insurance.
Microsoft is providing training curriculum, software and financial support to establish 12 POETA centers in Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, and Argentina. Each POETA center will be equipped with software and devices that make computers accessible to disabled students. Over the next 10-15 years, Trust for the Americas hopes to establish POETA centers throughout the Americas.
As for Reyna Ramos, she sees growth in her future, too. She plans to open a network of Internet cafes across Guatemala.
Marketing to the World
At Rail Bazar, women are hard at work in both of the cramped, dimly lit rooms, while the generator powering the computers hums in the background and the pungent smell of the latrine wafts through the small windows at the front of the building. As some of the women learn candle-making and beautician skills, most are seated in small groups around half a dozen PCs, encouraging each other to test their newly acquired technology skills.
Rail Bazar, and its 10 centers in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, is the result of a partnership between Microsoft and Datamation Foundation, a Delhi-based non-governmental organization focused on aiding women, economically and socially disadvantaged communities, and young people in India.
Many of the women taking computer courses at the centers are chikankary weavers, experts at traditional chikan embroidery. Chikan, which literally means embroidery, is used in clothing for men and women, as well as soft home furnishings. The graceful and elegant designs depend on a variety of stitches using different grades of thread to form the embroidery patterns. A chikan sari takes about a month for one person to produce.
Chikankary is a $50-million business in India, and about 60 percent of the chikan handicrafts are exported. The majority of chikankary work is produced in small workshops or in family homes that rely on orders provided by middlemen. The computer skills taught at the centers have given these women access to better designs and allowed them to market their products directly to customers in India and overseas. Rail Bazar also has implemented software developed by center partners, the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, and the National Institute of Fashion Technology, which is helping to improve product quality and reduce waste.
Fighting Human Trafficking
Throughout the Asia-Pacific region, low-income villagers—many of them young women and children—frequently migrate from rural to urban areas, lured by promises of economic opportunity and a better life. Once away from their home communities, however, their lack of skills and job prospects often put them at risk of falling victim to human trafficking, the modern equivalent of slavery, which often forces them into domestic service or prostitution without compensation.
In June 2006, Microsoft announced six UP grants, together valued at more than $1 million, to help combat human trafficking in the region. With the grants, NGOs in Cambodia, India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand will provide IT skills training to enhance the employment prospects and economic conditions of people most vulnerable to human traffickers, and those who have already been victimized. Through outreach efforts and sub-grants, the network will provide resources to more than 40 NGOs, including several in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and Vietnam.
Microsoft will support more than 130 new community technology centers, and more than 100,000 people will receive the benefits of technology through these grants over the next three years. In addition to financial support, Microsoft is also providing software and the Unlimited Potential curriculum, which is available in 10 languages that are used in Asia.
The Journey Continues
With our Unlimited Potential program, Microsoft provides technology skills training and workforce development through community technology learning centers. UP offers a basic IT curriculum in 21 languages and currently supports more than 600 projects and 15,000 community centers in 100 countries, reaching an estimated 28 million people—and we continue to expand our efforts.
We have made great strides in helping to strengthen local communities worldwide, and we’re proud of our successes, but we still have a long way to go. To increase our momentum and make even more progress, we must accomplish more for the people and communities we empower through better consolidation, sharper focus, and by ensuring that each of our efforts enhances others.
Working with our partners, we can create a world of new opportunities.
