What We Do
Community Economic Development
Social Innovation
Social Enterprise
Community Economic Development
At COIN, our hearts and minds belong to Community Economic Development (CED). CED is a strategy for understanding and taking action to improve our own communities. That is, it helps us decide what kind of activities are going to produce the best effect in Peterborough and take action.
We try to see the big picture of how money moves through our region and what the impact of that economic activity is for the people who live here. We collaborate with entrepreneurs, business, government, and others to assess the needs of different people in our community and brainstorm how we could use local resources to meet those needs in a way that is healthy and economically viable.
This kind of work leads to getting our hands dirty and feeling enormous pride and attachment towards the things we create together. People have been getting together to improve the economic opportunities open to them and their neighbours for millenia: CED isn’t new-fangled, but as with any creative process, it can produce something fabulously fresh that makes us understand ourselves and our world so much better.
What does CED look like? We call it CED when an initiative meets (a number of) the following 10 criteria:
1. Use of Local Goods and Services
When an enterprise sources locally, it is building a more secure supply line, supporting local entrepreneurs, and keeping money circulating locally. Peterborough EATS addresses the production gap in our local sustainable food system by developing links amongst local growers, culinary entrepreneurs, and the stores and restaurants that will carry their products. So if you order a gift basket from Basket Express, it may feature preserves made by a Peterborough entrepreneur, using produce from a farm in the County!
2. Production of Goods and Services for Local Use
CED initiatives respond to a local need for products or services. reBOOT Peterborough recognized that while many households need to dispose of the increasing amounts of electronic waste (e-waste) we’re generating, low income individuals and not-for-profit organizations have a need for basic computers and laptops in order to access economic opportunities or efficiently provide services. reBOOT meets all those local needs when it refurbishes your old computer and regifts or sells it cheaply as a charitable service.
3. Local Re-Investment of Profits
Some CED businesses are for-profit but they re-invest much or all of their profit in the community. For example, Northern Lights is a for-profit social enterprise that provides employment programs and services to help people reach their employment and training goals, but when they have a little extra, they put those resources into collaborating with other agencies to develop new programs to meet local needs.
4. Local Skill Development
We all have something to contribute to a community and doing so enriches our lives, but sometimes we need training or re-skilling to help us prepare to make that contribution. Peterborough EATS Café in the main branch of the public library serves delicious meals and treats while providing training opportunities to individuals with barriers to employment. These individuals are then ready for a career in the growing local food services sector.
5. Local Decision-Making and Ownership
CED enterprises can be collectively owned and run by staff or community members which often has the effect of engaging more individuals in CED, increasing their responsiveness to local needs, and multiplying the enterprise’s economic impact in the local economy. By the Bushel Community Food Cooperative is collectively owned by its members, including local growers, co-op staff, and consumers of local food. Everyone is a shareholder in the co-op, has a vote in important decisions, and an opportunity to run as a candidate for the Board of Directors.
6. Healthy Citizens
A great CED initiative makes an investment in physical, mental, and spiritual health in homes, workplaces and the wider community. The Seasoned Spoon is a cooperatively run, non-profit café located at Trent University’s suburban campus, where many people live and work. It promises “ethically-mindful fare” that constitutes a real alternative to the large food corporations that dominate campus. It also acts as a hub for student activities including local food activism and research (often for credit!), job experience, vegetable gardening, and long lazy lunches. It is democratically-run and sources much of its food locally.
7. Positive Physical Environment
CED wants healthy, safe, and good-looking communities as much as you do. ReStore, down on Erskine Avenue, sells second-hand building supplies and household appliances that renovating homeowners diverted from the dump by donating. ReStore’s profit supports Habitat for Humanity which builds affordable homes for those in need. When you buy from ReStore you help starve the landfills while getting attractive materials for your home – and no off-gassing!
8. Neighbourhood Stability
A CED initiative promotes stability and health in a community, rather than generating economic activity by, for example, selling products and services linked to addictive or dangerous behaviour. For example, Sadleir House is envisioned to be a meeting point for the university community and an interface between Trent and the broader Peterborough community.
9. Human Dignity
What this all adds up to is a philosophy in which the economy supports rather than competes with or undermines human dignity. CED aims to increase people’s capacity to better themselves through their own efforts. It is important to think about how to respond to the needs of people of varying ages, abilities, cultural backgrounds, sexual orientations, and gender identifications through a CED initiative. Tekdesk does it by running a wheel chair accessible lab in the basement of the public library and offering training in basic computer skills that allow new Canadians and seniors, among other groups, to gain skills in commonly used programs.
10. Support for Other CED Projects
CED projects support each other by collaborating, promoting each other’s activities online and in person, sharing resources, and buying from each other. For example, the Trent Centre for Community Based Education (TCCBE) brokers student research internships that benefit local businesses and other organizations, and reBOOT supplies the TCCBE with the computer hardware it needs to support that activity; The New Canadians Centre uses Tekdesk to provide computer skills training to its clients; and By the Bushel supplies Peterborough Eats products to Co-op members.
This definition of CED was inspired by United Nations Platform for Action's Women and the Economy Project in Winnipeg.
Social Innovation
While people have been doing this stuff forever, the concept of social innovation is still emerging and there are probably many passionate discussions over the exact definition occurring around the world as you read. At COIN, we are happy to use one provided by Mark Goldenberg of Canadian Policy Research Networks, who describes social innovation as “the development and application of new or improved activities, initiatives, services, processes, or products designed to address social and economic challenges faced by individuals and communities.”
Agents of social innovation exist in business, government, and voluntary sectors, and increasingly, collaboration amongst the three sectors is generating great solutions.
Social Enterprise
Social enterprises use market-based strategies to pursue a social purpose. This includes non-profit organizations using a business model to deliver products and services, and for-profits that prioritize their social goals over profit maximization. Social enterprises offer what is called “blended value” because they create ecological and social value in addition to economic value.
COIN has been a non-profit social enterprise since its inception in 1993. COIN was established as a community economic development (CED) corporation and as a social enterprise. COIN has always trained people with barriers to employment. This includes job search and job support after employment. COIN’s approach supports low-income people with multiple barriers to connect with the community and build economic security in a way that offers them dignity and an improved quality of life.
