[one_third][/one_third]The Silver Back Company Ltd (SBC) is a social business company created by the Environment and Rural Development Foundation (ERuDeF) in 2013. It aimed at assisting the communities in which ERuDeF is working, commercialise the products produced by the cooperatives.
Ignatius Njom
The SBC Ltd constitutes the principal source of funding to two endowments namely the ERuDeF Endowment Fund (EEF) the Forest Protection Fund (FoProF). It is currently involved in the commercialisation of palm oil, honey, Mondia and Echinops roots from the Lebialem Highlands.
Proceeds generated from the sales of the Silver Back Company go towards the capitalization of the Forest Protection Fund (FoProF), a community-based conservation trust fund and the ERuDeF Endowment Fund, designed to support the charitable activities of ERuDeF.
SBC Ltd buys her products from the community enterprises, processes the products and markets them. The cooperatives in return, invest proceeds from the sales into its activities.
[one_half][/one_half]The Company also re-invests 40% of the profits into SBC Ltd operations. Then 30% of the profits generated by SBC Ltd goes into the ERuDeF Endowment Fund another 30% into the Forest Protection Fund. This fund will carry out operations without depending entirely on the external funding.
The Forest Protection Fund seeks to support activities of protected area management like law enforcement, forest surveillance, biological monitoring and wildlife education in schools and communities. FoProF is a community-based conservation trust fund established by ERuDeF to support village level conservation initiatives of Village Forest Management Committees (VFMCs) and traditional councils.
In the next five years, with an estimated investment of $1.000, 000(FCFA 550,000,000) , the SBC Ltd will stand out as the main funder for these two endowments whose mission is to fund the charitable programmes of ERuDeF with focus on biodiversity and protected area management as well as other components of sustainable development.
SBC Ltd’s key investment will be in the domain of biodiversity business. SBC will continue to focus its trade on palm oil, non timber forest products, ABS products and maybe other products entering into the biodiversity realm.