The municipal program pilot “Startup for Youth People and Migrants” mobilizes the young people to become entrepreneurs and to stay in Moldova, considers Anatolie Palade, director of the consultancy company “ProConsulting” and co-author of the program. “It is important that any entrepreneur, when they initiate a program, should make an own contribution. This program comes to initiate the concept concerning the supporting of entrepreneurship by the municipality. Any economic development leads to the creation of jobs. We have economic and social expectations,” Anatolie Palade stated in a public debate entitled “Pilot municipal program “Startup for Youth People and Migrants: arguments for and against the implementation and extension” that was hosted by IPN.
The co-author of the project noted that the program focuses on innovative businesses, including information technologies, the production and services sectors, agriculture. It has two categories of criteria, including eligibility, which the assessment commission will use to select files. The contribution of a beneficiary will be minimum 30% of the value of the investment project. The beneficiary must have a certificate in entrepreneurship or a diploma of higher economic or legal education.
The migrants who want to take part in this program should confirm the status of migrant by a work contract, indicating the incomes earned based on this contract. The young investors who want to be repaid the interest should prove that they have an active investment loan agreement and that they made an investment. In the case of young refugee investors, there is only one additional criterion. They need to own a joint enterprise together with a resident of the municipality of Chisinau.
Anatolie Palade said that 10 million lei will be allocated initially and later the City Hall plans to identity other sources and to invite the development partners to support this program. “However, the entrepreneur needs to make an own financial contribution to show interest. We want to be sure that the business will be developed. Any program, if we speak about startups, needs educational support and post-investment assistance. A startup necessitates a lot of post-investment assistance. The City Hall will play a role here and will mobilize other partners to provide support.”
The municipal program pilot “Startup for Youth People and Migrants” was launched in Chisinau a week ago. Through the agency of the program, young people from Chisinau, including refugees, will be able to get grants of at most 200,000 lei for developing businesses. The young people who own a business and invested own money or borrowed funds in this will be refunded the interest rate for 24 months, in the amount of at most 100,000 lei.
