This Spring, CCEDNet Manitoba and Social Innovation Canada (an emerging national network of social innovators, hosted locally by the Social Enterprise Centre in Winnipeg) are working together to explore how our region can best meet the emerging opportunities of the federal Social Innovation and Social Finance Strategy.

While the full strategy is yet to be released, the federal government announced recently that it will start with a $50 million readiness fund and then a whopping $700 million social finance fund. How this will roll out is still developing, and we’ve been tagged to keep up to date and to meet with community economic developers and social enterprises across Manitoba to gauge interest and find out what our priorities for ‘readiness’ will be.

One thing we’ve already heard loud and clear is that the emerging language and practice of social innovation and social finance isn’t very familiar locally. So, we’ve developed a series of events to offer a range of topics and capacity building sessions to help us all find our fit in this emerging framework.

There will be a mix of speakers, workshops, and in-depth learning events spread over 4 months along with targeted meetings with a variety of stakeholders to provide a ‘springboard’ into social finance. It’s not the only thing we’ll do to help, and it won’t cover every example or possibility. We’ll try to have some events livecasted or recorded to make this information available more widely. Regardless, we hope it provides a springboard for talking, meeting, and finding our Manitoba way through this new federal development.

Check out the events below and share widely. If you’d like to find out more or get involved about our response to the fund announcement, contact regional director, Sarah Leeson-Klym.

Financing the Social Economy: The Quebec Experience 

March 19, 2019
11:30am - 1:30pm
Assembly Room at The WestEnd Commons
641 St Matthews Ave.

Free Registration + Lunch Included

Quebec’s social economy is a driver for the province’s economy overall. For several decades, the Chantier de l’économie sociale has been a key umbrella group organizing social economy actors, community economic developers, social movement activists, cooperative developers, and many others to develop a robust set of resources for non-profits, charities, social enterprises, and cooperatives.

Nancy Neamtan was the leader of the Chantier for much of its history. Having recently stepped down, she is working across Canada to document and share the learning of this key region. She joins us March 19 to explain the social finance landscape in Quebec including Réseau d’investissement social du Québec (RISQ) and the Chantier de l’économie sociale Trust.

Nancy has said that one of the key lessons learned is that the movement for a social economy made sure that everyone - non-profits, community developers, and enterprises - understood themselves as economic actors. They learned to understand the role of money and finance in their work. Now, we have the chance to build our local knowledge.

Join CCEDNet Manitoba and Social Innovation Canada for this event, part of a developing series, Springboard into Social Finance, to help us organize for the federal government’s emerging Social Innovation and Social Finance strategy.