KUCHING: People Systems Consultancy (PSC) Sdn Bhd has successfully increased the average incomes of about 70 percent of 14,000 participants from low income families who took part in its entrepreneurship programme.
Its Executive Director, Raymond Gabriel told a press conference this at the PSC office in Icom Square here yesterday.
A large number of the participants are from the urban and rural areas of Sabah and Sarawak.
PSC is a small, multinational social enterprise that works to significantly eradicate poverty in nations through its entrepreneurship programme.
The entrepreneurship programme called the Business Intelligence Programme includes three days of training and two months of hands-on mentoring with participants from marginalized and physically-challenged backgrounds throughout Malaysia and ASEAN regions.
PSC measures success from the increased income of each participant within two months and continuously mentors and monitors selected participants two to three years after their involvement in the programme.
“PSC sees itself as an economic solution to nations and an alternative to micro business developments solutions as all of the results achieved are done without any loans given upfront to participants from marginalised groups to start a business,” said Raymond.
“Since its formation, PSC has trained and transformed the lives of about 14,000 people in Malaysia and neighbouring countries like Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines.
“The average income increase per participant for 70 percent of the participants who undergo this programme is between 100 and 400 percent.
“These average income increases were achieved within a month of the programme and sustained thereafter.”
Raymond added no loans were given to participants even though PSC had tie-ups with major banks and micro funding agencies to help participants scale their businesses more after the training programme.
“This is to enable participants to work based on their own abilities and passions and to avoid overwhelming themselves with debts before their business is established.
“PSC introduces the participants to micro loan agencies only after completion of the mentoring, which is in the third month onwards.
“Some of the participants were tracked over two to three years and found to have increased their incomes continuously and sustainably over two to three years,” said Raymond.
The programme, he added, had been used to bring transformation to marginalised communities such as disabled community, hardcore poor, Orang Asli, single mothers, hardcore poor in the Indian community, at-risk groups in Sabah and Sarawak and disadvantaged youth groups and other at-risk groups.
Raymond said PSC had already carried out three major projects in Sabah and Sarawak including Project Sentuhan Harapan which was done in collaboration with Petronas and MyKasih Foundation to help the hardcore poor in Sabah and Sarawak.
It undertook the IM Sarawak project in collaboration with various state agencies to transform rural Sarawakians.
Raymond said PSC also joined forces with Maybank Foundation in its hugely successful Reach, Independence and Sustainable Entrepreneurship (RISE) project, a programme to help people with disabilities in Sabah and Sarawak as well as Peninsular Malaysia.
So far, PSC had trained more than 2,000 participants in Sabah and Sarawak under the RISE project, he said.
Meanwhile, its Project Manager and Sarawak team leader, Syamsiah Hamdin said she joined the company because PSC had a good programme to help the marginalised communities.
“It is good to see more social enterprises working to transform local communities without any agenda,” she added.
To know more about PSC, go to its website at www.peoplesystemconsultancy.com.
