Community Enterprises through the Bendigo Bank

Community Enterprise™ is an initiative of Bendigo Bank which has been created to improve the prospects of communities and to minimise the capital drain they face from the purchase of essential services such as telecommunications and energy.

The primary objective behind the Bendigo Bank's Community Enterprise strategy is the long-term sustainability of those communities who choose to partner with Bendigo Bank.

The strategy is basically about the local savings generated by the Bendigo "Community Banks" being invested in local projects.

This approach has been successful with Community Bank®s around Australia, and has been proven to also work in two locally owned Community Enterprise™ companies.

Community Enterprise™ has developed a number of solutions such as telecommunications, energy, Internet portals and the Community Enterprise™ Foundation.

When communities invest and buy through their own locally owned Community Enterprise™ company, they help generate:

• local profits
• jobs
• sustainability for the whole community.

The project needs to be within the catchment area of one of the 160 "Community Banks" (a network which is expanding at the rate of 30-40 per year).

Community Telcos 

The fastest growing field of social enterprise in the UK is community telcos - more than 300 have been established in the last three years. These are local businesses which aggregate community demand for telecommunications, and access a variety of services tailored to the needs of each community.

In Australia, community telcos have been much slower to develop, and the running has been made almost exclusively by the Bendigo Bank. The Bush Telegraph in north west Western Australia, and the Wagga community telecommunications venture, are exceptions. 

Bendigo Bank's three established telcos are:

Sunshine Coast Community Enterprise
iTel Community Telco in Ipswich, Queensland
Bendigo Community Telco

Follow this link to find out more about the Bendigo Bank's Community Enterprise strategy (opens in a new browser window)

For further information

Contact	:	Bendigo Bank, Bendigo, Victoria 3552
Address	:	PO Box 480
Phone	:	1300 366 666
Email	:	oncall@bendigobank.com.au

WWW

:

http://www.bendigobank.com.au