What is empowerment?
In 2004, our Founder Merrill J. Fernando reached out to small #entrepreneurs who lost their livelihoods in the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami. This marked the beginning of the Small Entrepreneurship Programme (SEP) – an initiative that has since supported around 2,100 rising small businesses, female entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs with disabilities, and rehabilitated prisoners.
One example is L. P. Anton – a struggling craftsman who used to travel to Colombo Friends in Need Society from Ambalangoda to get fitted for prosthetic limbs. We met him and supported him through the SEP with tools to expand his workshop.
Today, Anton’s craftwork adorns some of Sri Lanka’s largest handicrafts and souvenir shops. The progress of his career as an artisan has not only given him the opportunity to educate his two children but also allowed him to train four other artisans in his workshop.
But the SEP is much more than a grant-based programme. It involves in-depth evaluation before each grant is bestowed as a fixed sum in the form of equipment. Through close monitoring for the next two years, we ensure that beneficiaries grow not only their businesses, but their networks and their opportunities too. This is what makes the SEP a success story of #empowerment. This June, we visited almost 90 budding small entrepreneurs in Kalkudah, on Sri Lanka’s eastern coastline.
But empowerment doesn’t stop there. We also understand the need for skills development, networking, and bridging the digital literacy gap.
We recently invited 37 rural female micro-entrepreneurs in the food industry of the Eastern Province to a 4-day training programme. At our Empower Culinary & Hospital School in Kalkudah, they learnt new techniques and recipes for local dishes and juices. Our own Finance and IT instructors educated them about costing, financial management, savings, and using technology for advertising while the local Public Health Inspector shared some important information on food hygiene.
This June we commemorated #WorldMSMEDay2025 by recognising the need for skills and knowledge sharing to create better accessibility for small #entrepreneurs to grow their dreams.
Follow us on Facebook and Instagram at @mjffoundation to learn more about how we #MaketheWorldaBetterTea.
