Junior achievers show best of Pinoy young entrepreneurs

MANILA, Philippines - Two of the country’s most promising young creative entrepreneurs bested many other contenders from all over the region in the recent International Trade Challenge (ITC) held in Singapore. ITC is organized by Junior Achievement (JA), a global non-stock, non-profit organization dedicated to developing entrepreneurial skills and spirit among the youth. FedEx Express, a company member of JA, funds the competition which honors the role of international trade in shaping business fundamentals among the next generation of enterprise leaders.

Third placer Germaine Kaw and Sharmaine Yap from the Philippines proved to be excellent in many endeavors that are on a par with, if not among, the best in the region. They designed a vuvuzela MP4 music in response to this year’s ITC challenge which was to develop a market entry for exporting vuvuzelas, a horn, to South Africa. Kaw and Yap were screened and coached by Junior Achievement Philippines, Inc. (JAPI), the local subsidiary of JA.

Other winners were teams from Thailand (first place) and Malaysia (second place).

Now on its fourth year, the ITC has provided more than 4,300 students in Asia Pacific a firsthand experience of world trade; enhanced their knowledge of product distribution, promotion, and sales; and developed traits of competition, teamwork, risk-taking and self-confidence.

This year, 46 students aged between 16-19 years from Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, the Philippines, Vietnam and Thailand were chosen to represent their markets at the regional finals after competing at the local challenge in their respective home country.

“We are really pleased with the results and the quality of the Philippine delegation’s work. In fact, young Filipinos have great ability for creative problem solving — critical thinking out of the box”, said Gil G. Chua, member of the board of trustees of JAPI.

JAPI president Ernesto Alberto furthered, “Our role is to continually reach out to young students in the Philippines to help them achieve their fullest potential by providing real world opportunities for testing and implementing their business ideas.”