Social Entrepreneurship takes roots at SEPLAA

Event Report by Mrs. Amna Liaqat, Program Coordinator, SEPLAA Foundation.

SEPLAA Foundation held a ‘Two Week Social Entrepreneurship, CSR and Governance’ event in February and March 2013 which concluded with a Conference, Exhibition & Awards Ceremony.

During the 2 week period, the SEPLAA Foundation held it’s third Annual SEPLAA Talent of Pakistan: Awards, Exhibition & Conference at various universities and forums by arranging seminars, talks and discussions on ‘Social Entrepreneurship for youth’ at Punjab University, FC College, Lahore College, COMSATS, Plan 9 PITB Tech Incubator and Sharif Education Complex where Mrs. Ammara Farooq Malik, the Founder and CEO of the SEPLAA Foundation was the speaker at these seminars.

The event also promoted the concept of Pakistani Talent in social entrepreneurship and effectively has reached out to over 5500 people through social media and seminars.

The event concluded with the Exhibition put up by Women Entrepreneurs, Professional guidance stalls for career counselling, workshop and conference registration, family stalls and stalls for children at the Royal Palm Golf & Country Club. There were also children, youth, women and professional experts speaking during the Open Mike Sessions which kept the audience interested throughout the event. Judges for the Open Mike were Ms. Sara Khalid, Ms. Zarin Shoaib, Mr. Ahmed Saeed, Mr. Rashid Turabi, Mr. Bakhtiar Khwaja and Mr. Atif Tufail.

The event concluded with the SEPLAA Foundation Conference on promoting corporate social responsibility and good governance for social uplift. The event was organized keeping the role of social entrepreneurs and socially responsible companies in mind which forward the cause of bringing about a positive change in our country. The Key note speakers on the event were Mrs. Ammara Farooq Malik, Founder & CEO SEPLAA Foundation and Mr. Jeffery Bakken, Director USAID, Acting US Counsel General.

Several companies are still not aware of the benefits of corporate social responsibility and we need to see more companies as role models in this position so that they can help the development sector and social entrepreneurs in solving the problems in our society’, pointed out Mrs. Malik.

Mr. Bakken expressed that Pakistanis give an enormous amount of charity every year and that amount can be channelized to create sustainable social development projects for Pakistan.

This was followed by a Panel discussion with corporate sector and development sector experts. The Panel included Mr. Khubaib Ahmed, HR Head/ /HRBP, Descon Integrated Projects Limited, Dr. Saeed Shafqat , Professor and Director Centre for Policy & Governance, FC College, Mr. Ayub Ghauri, Senior VP Netsol, Mr. Waseem Ashraf, Governance Specialist USAID and Mr. Haroon Education Specialist USAID. The Panel concluded that Public Private partnerships are the need of the hour to create sustainable projects that can help fill the gaps in education, health, youth development and governance in our society.

Later, Barrister Ahmad Farooq Malik, Founding Member SEPLAA Foundation and Partner at JUS & REM gave the token of thanks and conference mementos to the speakers.