We Think – We Do

Social Entrepreneurship Projects

Black & white Taxi Top Advertising Project”
In the early 2000s Global Trade Matters in association with the Ministry of Interior General Traffic Department and Governorate of Cairo, Giza, Qaloubia, Red Sea, Port Said, Ismailia and Alexandria, launched the “Black & white Taxi Top Adverting Project” which included over 3800 independent owned taxi vehicles across the country. This project impacted the livelihood of an estimated 30,000 people over the project span of 7 years. The “Global Trade Matters Black & white Taxi Top Advertising Project” aligned with our organizations blend of for-profit goals and generating a positive “return to society” through raising annual incomes for participating drivers by 10% while reducing running costs of the vehicles by as high as 19%. Vehicles participating in the project also increased their revenues through becoming part of a larger fleet of transport solutions. The “Black & white Taxi Top Adverting Project” was funded through advertising revenues provided by international private sector companies such as Orange, Vodafone, Chloride, Western Union, Nestle, Honeywell and many others.

MiniMart Kiosks Project
In association with the Governorate of Cairo, Giza, Alexandria, El Menia, Port Said and Ismailia, Global Trade Matters launched the “MiniMart Kiosks Project” which aimed at revamping over 120,000 street side kiosks across the country. This city beatification and development project physically replaced old and unregulated Kiosk with brand new designs in conforming to government licenses and regulations, in addition to enhancing space usage for more shelf space and products, while streamlining the supply chain through achieving economies of scale across the network. MiniMart Kiosks Project was funded through private sector advertising for companies such as Coca Cola, Orange, HoneyWell, Cadbury and British American Tobacco.

Special Education for Advancement Boarding School for Special Needs
In 2012 Global Trade Matters in partnership with private investors, developed and built the Special Education for Advancement Boarding School for Special Needs on the outskirts of Cairo bridging an ever-growing gap between over 11 million Egypt’s with special needs and international education allowing young Egyptians to access new sturdy and work opportunities. Over 150 students were registered at the first year of operations with the school hosting some of the qualified faculty and medical staff. As per the schools Social Responsibility SEA applied a balanced tuition approach allowing parents with better financial standings to support students whose parents could not afford the full tuition. Global trade Matters exited its investment in SEA in 2012, yet the school is still operation and continues to serve a wide range of local, regional and international students.

The Village Center (Conference Center)
In 2014, Global trade Matters entered into and agreement with Smart Villages Development Company, the owner/operator of the Smart Village Egypt, the country’s leading technology, finance and education hubs located on the Cairo Alexandria Desert road only 20 Minutes from the center of Cairo. The partnership gave Global trade Matters the management right to the Smart Village Conference Center know known as the “Village Center”, a state f the art-conferencing and meeting facility build on an area of 5,800sqm in the heart of the business park. With over 55,000 employees frequenting Smart Village daily, Global Trade Matters transformed the once underutilized facility to create a true center for the Smart Village Community including a food court with a diverse service offering creating convenience for the vast number of employees while reducing costs for employers whose staff would otherwise have to leave the business park. Part of this transformation included attracting new clientele for conferences, meetings, and exhibitions while providing the over 178 companies operating in the business park with a much-needed events space. In less than two years The Village Center had reached an amazing 75% space utilization covering 365 utilization days. Clients include Huawei, Valeo, Infor, Xerox, IBM, Microsoft, Alex Bank, the Egyptian Stock Exchange, Smart Villages Schools, The Arab Academy for Science and Technology, the French Chamber of Commerce, The Egyptian Ministry of Communications and Technology, Commercial International Bank and others.

The Sidewalk Food & Services (SME Enhancement Project)
As part of Global Trade Matters ongoing efforts in developing projects for the enhancement of Small and Medium Enterprises, 2015 saw the launch of the Sidewalk project which saw the development of a food and services area to cater for over 55,000 people working and visiting Smart Village daily. Today The Sidewalk is comprised of 25 operational outlets offering anything from food and beverages to services such Orange and Valu. Most of the operating outlets are local startup brands taking advantage of the low setup cost, affordable rents and a daily footfall of over 2,000 people.