Guatemala

<p style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-size: 14px;">Within the framework of the border modernization process in Central America, this project seeks to generate economic opportunities and promote productive and decent work mainly for informal and unemployed workers and people involved in menial economic activities located at the Guatemalan border in Ciudad Pedro de Alvarado.&nbsp;</span></p><p style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-size: 14px;">In the pilot phase, the project will seek to address institutional weaknesses and deficiencies hindering informal entrepreneurs advancement in education and in the labor market through skills development, access to micro-finance and employment promotion.&nbsp;</span></p><p style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-size: 14px;">In the second phase, the project will seek to develop profitable businesses with groups of beneficiaries who acquired relevant skills in sectors with potential for domestic and export sales. In parallel, the project will continue to enhance Ciudad Pedro de Alvarado&rsquo;s position to attract investments building on the new brand developed during the pilot phase.</span></p><p style="text-align:justify"><span style="font-size: 14px;">Doing so, the project is expected to i) enable informal entrepreneurs to reduce their level of dependency on income derived from border activities and their presence in the primary border areas devoted to border control and inspection functions and to ii) reduce the propensity of border communities to migrate thanks to the new economic opportunities in border areas.</span></p><p><br></p><p><br></p>

<p><strong>Central America: Women and E-commerce</strong></p><p>The project Linking Central American Women Business Enterprises (WBEs) with the Global Gifts and Home Decoration Market aims to improve the export performance of women-led-enterprises from Central America to sell online.</p><p>The project beneficiaries are women-led-companies involved in the sale and export of handicrafts for the gift and home decoration industries from Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panam&aacute;.</p><p>The project funded by the European Union (EU) has been implemented between 2018 and 2021 by the International Trade Centre (ITC) in collaboration with the Secretariat for Central American Economic Integration (SIECA) and in partnership with national organizations.</p><p>To achieve its objective, the project has produced five immediate results as follows:</p><ul><li>WBEs have increased their export business management skills for online commercialization.</li><li>WBEs&rsquo; products and services have exhibit enhanced design, quality and compliance with market trends and customers&rsquo; demands</li><li>WBEs have developed high quality digital and promotional material.</li><li>WBEs have established connections with business partners through increased presence on the Web</li></ul><p>WBEs have acquired the technical know-how to fulfil electronic buyers&rsquo; orders.</p>

<p>Clothing is one of the largest industries in the world economy employing 60 to 75 million people worldwide. The negative social and environmental impacts of the fashion industry have been well documented, demonstrating that these impacts mostly occur within the upstream portion of the value chain. Improving traceability is a priority in order to determine how and where parts and components in production processes have been sourced and what are the environmental, social and health risks in the value chain. The action will support enhanced transparency and traceability in garment value chains, through the development of an IT &apos;track and trace&apos; platform that offers customized and open self-assessment and data sharing solutions for value chain stakeholders. Alongside the implementation of this platform, ITC will deliver a training and continuous improvement programme and, in collaboration with private sector partners, implement in a subset of textile and garment oriented countries.</p>