Social economy

Bank of Greece Governor Yannis Stournaras on Tuesday said there were encouraging signs from the development of micro-funding in Greece.

Google will distribute EUR 2 million in gratuitous funds among organizations in Bulgaria and other ten countries of the region for the support of their charity projects.  

Today Google launched the first of its kind initiative in Central and Eastern Europe Google.org Impact Challenge.

Three global lenders are providing loans to finance the construction of a new metro line in Istanbul.     

Bulgarian Small and Medium Enterprises Promotion Agency will help in organizing a series of EaSi loan applications training for the European Investment Fund. The Executive Director of the Agency Dr. Boyko Takov and Mr. Detelin Tsvetanov, Head of Crediting and Leasing at the microfinance institution „Jobs", a group of the Bulgarian Development Ban agreed on this.

In Plovdiv, Vice President Iliana Yotova opened the eighth edition of the European Forum for Social Entrepreneurship.

UK-based humanitarian relief agency Oxfam and another 24 nongovernmental organizations sent an open letter to European leaders calling for changes to migration policy, especially with regards to Greece, where the situation for thousands of refugees and migrants is "unsustainable."

The Novi Sad-based SHARE Foundation NGO warned that the Serbian authorities are pushing through the country's first Law on Critical Infrastructure without a period of public discussion or a clear definition of what exactly is meant by critical infrastructure. 

The Hellenic American Leadership Council (HALC) has donated 150,000 dollars to SOS Children's Villages for the support of 17 orphaned children whose home was destroyed in this summer's wildfires in Attica.

Cosmetics company Apivita is the first Greek firm to receive the B Corporation certification, becoming a member of an international network of companies and organizations that aspire to combine entrepreneurship with social welfare and use the power of markets to solve social and environmental problems.

Self-styled anarchist group Rouvikonas stormed into the offices of British aid organization Oxfam in central Athens Thursday and threw paint to protest against a sex abuse scandal affecting the charity.

Ten people who had covered their faces smashed windows and damaged computers before leaving the NGO's premises on Patission Street.