Romania: Làszlò Potozky

Làszlò Potozky, founder and director of the Romanian Environmental Partnership Foundation – a grant making organisation that supports and promotes the improvement of the environment and the development of communities in Romania – meets Vita Europe in the last chapter of our four part focus on local development strategies in Central Eastern Europe in which we have met experts from Hungary, the UK and now Romania in the fields of Csr, social banking, philanthropy and development.

Euclid, the European network of third sector leaders, will be holding its Leadership development in Central and Eastern Europeconference in Budapest next week, 17-18 April, at which Làszlò Potozky is a keynote speaker. The conference, that will bring together experts from across Europe, will explore multi-stakeholder approaches to local development, and will focus especially on the partnership between financial institutions and the third sector.

Mr Potozky has been active in the European third sector since 1993 and is board member to 12 national and international non profit boards and steering committes.

What is the most important criteria you keep in mind when allocating grants to civil society?
Over the last nine years our foundation awarded over 400 small grants to NGOs which are active in the field of environmental protection, community development and local heritage preservation. Basicaly each grant awarded by our organization is supporting projects that: are practical, and at the same time are producing visible results; have to be community based, so it has to involve local communities in all the phases of the project; are contributing at the same time to the organizational development of the implementing foundation or association. Thanks to this approach the majority of these projects are quite successful, proving the fact that even small money, if used wisely, can make the difference.

Are you involved in the promotion of civil engagement in Eastern Europe?
The Romanian Environmental Partnership Foundation is member of the Environmental Partnership for Sustainable Association, a Central Eastern European initiative that brings together 6 independent foundations from Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia. The six organizations are engaged beside their own country based programs, in regional initiatives that are aiming community based environmental protection and sustainable development across the region. One of the most successful initiatives in this sense, are the Central European Greenways, that are bringing plenty of benefits for the environment, contribute to the improvement of the quality of life, and at the same time represent an opportunity for sustainable economic activities in towns and villages along the greenway. Currently there are over 20 such Greenways in the region, thanks to the support and expertise of the six Environmental Partnership Foundations.

Do you consider social enterprises to be the new frontier of the non profit sector and does the social enterprise model already function in Romania ?
The booming of social enterprises in many countries represents an important step for the non-profit sector development. I consider the social enterprise model, a fantastic opportunity for the non profit organizations in becoming more successful in achieving their objectives. At the same time I believe that it can represent a huge contribution to raising the independency of the sector, thanks to the financial sustainability that can arise from such initiatives. Unfortunately at this moment here in Romania we cannot speak about it, as a well known practice, yet. One of the first initiatives that tried to promote and encourage such endeavors was the Social Enterprise Competition organized by NESst, Leaders Romania and ABN Amro in 2007.

What do expect from Euclid ?s meeting in Budapest and what do you expect to bring to it?
My hope is that the Budapest conference will be an excellent learning oportunity about new succesful third sector initiatives. At the same time I am expecting to be a place for qulaity experience exchange and an opportunity to meet new people with interested in the same topics with me.

More info
www.epce.ro

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