A Barbudan, who has partnered with the Barbuda Resilience Fund at the International Community Foundation, has made it possible for a few entrepreneurs whose businesses were ravaged by Hurricane Irma in 2017 to benefit from a grant-funding project.
Rae Beazer, through a successful proposal, was able to garner support for a project that was set up to help Barbudans who operated businesses before and after Hurricane Irma, and have taken steps to redevelop said businesses on their own.
“A lot of persons had the opportunity to write proposals through this entity and I wrote one, and the one that I wrote was this, which is a small business grant for small businesses here in Antigua and Barbuda. It’s basically where people who owned a business before the hurricane can now be helped,” Beazer said in an interview on the Barbuda Channel.
She said her proposal was prompted by the observation that while the houses were being rebuilt in Barbuda, the businesses had failed to gain any traction.
Beazer said it is the business community that will cause the island to thrive again.
As a result of her initiative, total of 16 owners of small businesses will be afforded the opportunity to select $3,000 worth of equipment from the Town House Mega Store in Antigua. The grant also includes free travel to and from Barbuda to collect and transport the items.
Beazer is no stranger to lifting a finger to help those in need, as – upon realizing that there were no schools after the Category 5 Super Hurricane had destroyed the island – she opened a temporary learning center at the People’s Church in Barbuda.
The school registered 54 students with only five trained teachers.