North Belfast Ethical Investment (NBEI)

Project Name:	North Belfast Ethical Investment
Zone:	Belfast North
Category:	Revenue
Social Investment Fund Outcome:	Reducing Deprivation
Status:	Delivery Complete
Funding awarded:	£1,476,403

About the Project:

The North Belfast Ethical Investment (NBEI) project was a social economy project aimed at helping community groups set up, support and develop market-ready property-based projects in North Belfast. It sought to support and identify projects capable of making a significant impact on the area’s underlying social, economic and environmental problems.

The project was designed to:

• support the creation of new asset-based social enterprises and support their development in the first years of growth;
• help grow viable asset-based social enterprises in order to strengthen sustainability and long term profitability;
• create a portfolio of asset based ethical property regeneration projects in north Belfast;
• highlight the lessons and best practice for community groups, policy and the development of the social economy in Northern Ireland on a regular basis;
• provide business mentoring; and
• facilitate training and/or further educational opportunities.

Examples of assistance provided by the programme included architectural, planning and design services, business planning and economic feasibility work, legal and marketing support as well as the recruitment of project staff and bespoke business mentoring.

Progress to date:

This project has been completed delivery. The project has provided training courses, job placements and support for businesses and individuals in the local economy, helping to address problems with access to employment and training within the SIF North Belfast zone. 22 business were supported with 51 jobs created and participating projects developed a more commercial approach to social enterprise management and enhanced skills in specific areas such as digital marketing and sales. Learning and best practice is shared via the NBEI portal (https://www.edtnorth.org/) ensuring this SIF project has a positive legacy both in terms of informing sustainable social enterprise practice and policy going forward.

A number of short films on Social Investment Fund projects and outcomes have been produced. Below is the link to a short film that captures the impact the Ethical Investment project has had:

Impacts:

Monitoring and evaluation of all Social Investment Fund projects is carried out using “Outcomes Based Accountability” (OBA). The infographic below details some of the key impacts of the Ethical Investment project.