It's exciting that our company has been nominated for the Tucson Metro Chamber Copper Cactus Awards presented by Wells Fargo. It is truly an honor to be nominated as it speaks volumes of how our team and Startup Unidos are perceived in the community.
Startup Unidos (SU) is the driver of innovation in environmental sustainability and social justice in borderland communities of Southern Arizona, specifically the Arizona-Sonora (USA/MEX) region. Our services are culturally-anchored, bilingual, and serve the underserved through innovative workforce development and entrepreneurship-centric approaches that support emerging entrepreneurs and growing firms.
Our flagship product is Emprende Amigo, a bilingual, international, fully remote, youth course on the foundations of entrepreneurship. This program solves for the lack of opportunities in the region by being a launchpad for emerging entrepreneurs. Already in 2020, Emprende Amigo has certified 75 people and has a line of sight to well over 100 to round out the year.
A pillar of our most successful product, WASTE NOT, is the Fellowship in Food Waste that exists to turn the 6,000 tons of fresh food waste into opportunities for economic development instead of landfill development. This has been made possible for over two years through our unique ability to forge partnerships with the University of Arizona’s (UA) Agnese Nelms Haury Program in Environment and Social Justice, UA Southwest Folk Alliance and UA Office of Sustainability / Compost Cats, Tecnológico de Monterrey CNS; PrepaTec CSN and Tecmilenio HMO and CHI across Tucson, AZ USA, Ambos Nogales, AZ USA/SON MEX, and Hermosillo, Sonora MEX. To date, the program has hosted 13 events, created 55 educational and experiential lessons for 34 youth entrepreneurs from youth from all over the region passionate about building innovative solutions to local sustainability issues.
