The Village Capital is currently accepting applications for their catalytic accelerator for business owners supporting ecosystem restoration in Latin America, Innovation for Ecosystem Restoration: LatAm 2023.
The Innovation for Ecosystem Restoration: LatAm 2023 will address some of the most pressing issues that ecosystem restoration entrepreneurs in LatAm are currently facing, such as the lack of investment capital and support for developing ecosystem restoration. The goal is to deliver a catalytic accelerator for entrepreneurs championing ecosystem restoration throughout LatAm.
Benefits:
- Mentorship
- Ability to meet with and receive mentorship from prominent Latin American and U.S. investors, potential strategic partners, investors, potential customers, and other founders.
- Financial Analysis
- Access to an investment analyst who will coach you 1:1 on building a financial model, identifying unit economics, and using financial metrics to drive both the business and investor diligence
- Media Exposure
- Exposure to Village Capital’s program website and other communications collateral.
- Networking
- Access to a diverse and inclusive network of mentors and founders
- Continued Learning
- Access to live and asynchronous sessions tailored to a virtual learning environment to help their companies identify early milestones and prepare for their next round of capital (if relevant) or big expansion.
- Advice
- Startups will also be able to participate in a virtual Investor Forum and mock board meetings with representatives from financial institutions, corporates, experienced entrepreneurs, and investors that can help their company scale.
Eligibility:
Village Capital is looking for (for-profit) startups building locally viable ecosystem restoration solutions. Eligibility requirements include:
- Have legal incorporation and operations as a for-profit entity in at least one Latin American country.
- Have a market-based solution that tackles ecosystem restoration challenges in Latin America.
- Have at least one full-time founder based in Latin America.
- Be in compliance with local fiscal and business law.
- Have a minimum viable product (MVP), and raised less than $1M in equity.
- Have meaningful customer or business validation (not limited to revenue, it can also be successful pilot studies, number of users, and/or strategic partnerships).
Requirements:
- Forest Restoration
- Village Capital is looking for solutions focused on restoring forest ecosystems through reforestation, improvement of degraded forests’ condition, conservation of wild plants, protection of essential parts of the forest ecosystem, and promotion of sustainable logging practices.
- Landscape Restoration
- Solutions focused on reversing the degradation of soils and combating desertification. These can be solutions that promote regenerative agriculture practices like the use of natural fertilizers and pest control, use of crop rotation, and mainly promote farming that uses soil preservation as the entry point to regenerate and contribute to multiple provisioning, regulating, and supporting services.
- Restoration of Aquatic Production Ecosystems
- Solutions that maintain ecosystem structure and function to support food provisioning while minimizing impacts. These can be solutions that promote sustainable fishing practices, that re-seed or transplant key species, that enhance the treatment of pollutants before they reach the oceans, and that promote ocean cleaning practices. Additionally, Village Capital is looking for solutions focused on coral reefs, mangroves and seagrass management.
- Rewilding
- Solutions that focus on rebuilding a natural ecosystem following major human disturbance by restoring natural processes and the complete or near complete food-web at all trophic levels as a self-sustaining and resilient ecosystem using biota that was present before any human intervention.
