The ”la Caixa” Foundation,  BPI, and Nova School of Business & Economics (Nova SBE) launched today Iniciativa para a Equidade Social [Social Equity Initiative], a partnership that aims to promote the social sector in Portugal on a long run. The signing ceremony of the protocol is taking place today at 06:30 p.m. at Nova SBE, in Carcavelos, with the presence of Isidro Fainé, President of the Banking Foundation ”la Caixa.”
 

As part of the partnership, the ”la Caixa” Foundation and BPI will provide 2.2 million euros throughout an initial period of three years as a way to recognize the importance that the social sector has for the country in terms of the number of organizations, human resources, impact on society, expenses, and social supports.

Among the projects that are part of  Iniciativa para a Equidade Social [Social Equity Initiative], we have:

• the release of the annual report “Balanço Social do País“ [“Social Report of the Country”], which depicts the social-economic framework of Portuguese families, focusing primarily on situations of deprivation and exclusion, and, whenever possible, on the access to the existing social support  in Portugal;
   
• the creation of a public based data to consolidate information, currently scattered, on social organizations in Portugal, to facilitate the knowledge and intervention of the several stakeholders in the sector;
   
• two training programs aimed at the social sector. The first, designed in more traditional molds of classroom formation, is directed at leaders of social sector entities. The second is a pioneering initiative that intends to diagnose and monitor social sector institutions in different areas of management, through the Nova SBE community (students, Alumni, Professors, and partners) throughout the beginning of Iniciativa.
   

In total, the initiative involves the creation of seven projects and two chairs dedicated to the social sector, in collaboration with four Nova SBE Knowledge Centers: Nova SBE Leadership for Impact Knowledge Center, Nova SBE Economics for Policy Knowledge Center, Nova SBE Finance Knowledge Center, and Nova SBE Data Science Knowledge Center.

Iniciativa para a Equidade Social complements BPI’s and the "la Caixa"’s Foundation intervention in the social sector in Portugal. This includes five prizes aimed at supporting social institutions’ projects, with an estimated value of 3.75 million euros in 2019, in addition to their own programs in the employment, palliative care and, soon, childhood and seniors areas.

“This is one of the most relevant and ambitious partnerships that the “la Caixa” Foundation has established in Portugal, since it arrived in the country, less than a year ago. Alongside Nova SBE, we want to put knowledge and innovation at the service of the Portuguese population, especially vulnerable people. We are a foundation with a history of more than a century, and our experience proves that these kinds of partnerships with renowned institutions mirror the well-being of the citizens”, explained Isidro Fainé, the President of the “la Caixa” Banking Foundation.

"BPI is possibly one of the entities in Portugal with a more comprehensive knowledge about the social sector. For more than a decade, through Prémios de Solidariedade BPI [BPI Solidarity Awards], we have come to know in detail the work, but also the difficulties of thousands of social institutions all over the country. The reinforcement of the partnership we have with the Nova SBE will allow us to strenghthen the complementarities between the "la Caixa" BPI Awards, the entities supported they support, and the projects launched today within this initiative, which bring more value to our country", stated the honorary president of BPI and curator of the "la Caixa" Foundation, Artur Santos Silva.

Iniciativa para a Equidade Social [Social Equity Initiative] alongside BPI and the “la Caixa” Foundation, will be a partnership that will help map Portugal’s social situation and empower organizations that daily strive to improve it. We want to work together to create and contribute to having an impact in Portugal, Europe, and the world. We are sure that with the support of all stakeholders and the team involved, this initiative will be a success, "says Daniel Traça, Dean of Nova SBE.

The “la Caixa” Foundation in Portugal: a 20 million euro budget for 2019

The "la Caixa” Foundation, based in Spain, is one of the most relevant foundations internationally. It started its implementation in Portugal in 2018, as a result of the BPI becoming part of the CaixaBank Group. In 2018, it allocated 12 million euros to social, research, educational, and cultural and scientific dissemination projects. This investment will amount to 20 million euros in 2019.

The President of the Foundation, Isidro Fainé, underlined the main results of the impact that the Foundation’s activity has since it arrived in Portugal in early 2018, until April of this year. The main accolades are:

- 450 jobs provided through the program Incorpora for people in vulnerable situations, thanks to the involvement of circa 200 companies.

In Portugal, and in collaboration with the IEFP – Instituto do Emprego e Formação Profissional [Institute for Employment and Vocational Training], 33 social entities are responsible for developing Incorpora by working in network in different regions: Lisbon (14 entities), Porto (9), Coimbra (5), and Setúbal (5). In 2019, a new competition was launched to amplify the Incorpora network  in Viseu, Guarda, Évora, Beja, and Faro.

- Nearly 1500 patients and 1700 family members received help via the Humaniza program, which provides comprehensive care for people with advanced diseases.

The “la Caixa” Foundation has also 10 teams that provide psychosocial support, which are located at different regions of the country: north, center, Lisbon, Alentejo, Algarve, the Azores, and Madeira.

- 77 social entities’ projects were funded with 2.25 million euros through the BPI “la Caixa” Awards, which began to contemplate five categories in 2019, instead of the three initials: Capacitar, Seniores, Solidário, Infância, and Rural [Enable, Seniors, Supportive,  Childhood and Rural].

- Five initiatives to bring dynamism to the frontier regions supported through the Promove program. More specifically, the program selected innovative pilot projects to help the development of the areas in which they are located (Bragança, Guarda, Proença-a-Nova, and Elvas) and simultaneously that can be replicated in other regions with similar features.

- Strategic alliances with renowned cultural institutions. Such as the Serralves Foundation, a partner of the Anish Kapoor exhibition, of the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga [National Museum of Ancient Art], which organized the “Terra Adentro” exhibition. “Spain from Joaquín Sorolla”, presented at the Casa da Música, where the participatory concert O Messias and the school concert “O Colecionador de Paisagens” were also presented.

- 4.6 million euros meant for eight projects of excellence in biomedicine and health investigation (2.2 million that correspond to the matching fund with FCT – a Portuguese national funding agency for science, research, and technology).

- More than 100.000 visitors in the itinerant exhibition “A floresta. Muito mais do que madeira” [The forest. Much more than wood], that reached seven important cities in Portugal throughout 2018 and the first few months of 2019, namely Coimbra, Viseu, Braga, Portimão, Castelo Branco, Setúbal, and Matosinhos.