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| ILS-LEDA (International Liaison Services for Local Economic Development Agencies)
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Since 1991, Local Economic Development Agencies (LEDAs) have been promoted within the framework of international cooperation projects in developing countries, with particular preference for those ravaged by conflict, disasters or relevant social problems.
LEDAs are self-sustained, non-profit structures with legal personality and functional autonomy. They have participation from local stakeholders from both the public sector (local administrations, decentralised arms of the national Government) and the private sphere (associations, chambers of commerce, trade unions, producers’ organisations, banks), which agree on strategies, instruments and initiatives aimed at developing a certain territory. They have access to links with national and international partners and networks, allowing the local economy to make the best use of the globalisation opportunities.
LEDAs offer services to entrepreneurs and institutions in areas such as information, entrepreneurship promotion, technical assistance for the creation of micro, small and medium enterprises, for start-up and development, special credit for investment, project financing, economic development planning and monitoring, territorial marketing. In this way, they function as a weapon against poverty: they facilitate the inclusion of the poor into the economic circuit by providing the resources they lack, combating in such a way a traditional model of economic development that assigns the task and privilege of producing wealth to only a segment of the population.
LEDAs have economic viability, mainly through the interest earned on credit capital for credit operations. Additional resources may come from different local, national and international sources; contributions of members, revenue from assignments to manage targeted national programs within the territory, fees for services.
Since 1998 UNDP/UNOPS (United Nations Development Program/United Nations Office for Project Services), ILO (International Labour Organization), Italian Cooperation, EURADA (European Association of Development Agencies) have promoted a special initiative for supporting the liaison of the mentioned LEDAs with developing country environments: the International Liaison Services for Local Economic Development Agencies (ILS-LEDA).
ILS-LEDA provides networking services to local economic development agencies in developed countries and/or countries in economic transition, with the aim of helping them reach a higher level of efficiency in the delivery of their services and in the pursuit of their goals.
ILS-LEDA also offers a wide range of opportunities to meet the needs of the internationalisation of European local economies and communities, particularly promoting medium and long-term alliances between North and South territories, based on the services offered by LEDAs or by UNDP/UNOPS initiatives in developing countries. This kind of twinnings, called Territorial Partnerships, are referred in the website section “Case studies” and constitute a new approach for cooperation issues. |
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