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Community Business and Environment Centre
This community business organisation is based in Kaitaia and has seeded and helped develop a number of community enterprises around the country. CBEC’s objectives are to promote and establish community-owned businesses that deliver good outcomes for the environment, generate employment for their communities and foster sustainable economic development for their regions.
We have made several loans to CBEC as it has gone from strength to strength in developing a range of activities and joint venture businesses.
A core part of CBEC's strategy in developing community businesses is by helping develop resource recovery and recycling ventures, often in partnership with other community organisations.
In it's own right CBEC has also continued to develop other services and activities in the Far North. It approached Prometheus for an additional business development loan to cover the costs of purchasing an existing mini-skip business.
This was principally to allow CBEC to expand it's commercial recycling operations to include commercial waste collection as well. However, it also enabled CBEC to fulfil a contract with the Ministry for the Environment's Sustainable Management Fund to analyse wastes from the building and construction sector and determine how much of that waste stream could be diverted from landfill. Their loan application also included additional funds to upgrade some of their existing equipment and vehicles.
CBEC has an enviable track record both in it's own right and in conjunction with it's joint venture partners. It has managed to regularly exceed the Key Performance Indicators in it's contract with the council and has also shown consistently strong financial performance. These factors, together with CBEC's strong social and environmental objectives meant that we were happy to approve this latest loan application.