CEPES: the other way to start a business

CEPES is the confederation of associations representing companies in the Social Economy sector in Spain, which reports to the Ministry of Labour. Its functions are to advise and support entrepreneurs, promote projects and regulations and disseminate all information related to this new way of doing business.

The concept of Social Economy encompasses all economic activities within the market that share the same values: the primacy of people over capital, the equitable distribution of profits, and the principles of cohesion, solidarity, and social responsibility. In these enterprises, the worker is the owner, and the profits are reinvested in the same organizations.

CEPES, therefore, is the business confederation that represents this entire Social Economy movement in Spain. Examples of this way of doing business include cooperatives, mutual societies, worker-owned companies, foundations, social reintegration firms, and special employment centers.

Under all these entrepreneurial legal structures, 46.000 SMEs operate in Spain, employing 1,8 million people and generating €69 billion in revenue, equivalent to 7% of GDP. They are unevenly distributed throughout Spain, although they are more numerous in Andalusia and the Basque Country.

Carmen Comos, technical director of CEPES, explains that "the Confederation operates through 23 sectoral and regional organizations or associations, whose function is to directly advise its members and promote entrepreneurship." "CEPES reserves the right to carry out projects that, due to their content or scope, cannot be undertaken by a member association, such as inter-company cooperation and international development platforms," she adds.

CEPES' international work is one of its key strengths, and it seeks to defend Spain's interests in this sector with respect to Europe, Latin America, and North Africa. In this regard, the organization's relationships with other international bodies and the Spanish government are crucial for securing parliamentary recognition of the tax and economic benefits these companies receive.

CEPES' funding comes from the Ministry of Labor and from its members' dues, which constitute the confederation's main sources of income.

Internationalization

For small businesses, CEPES has an international relations working group, where technicians identify their needs for going abroad.

“To achieve this, we created RECIPES, a cooperation network for the internationalization of social economy SMEs, supported by all the organization's members,” explains Carmen Comos. The advantage this network offers over other internationalization measures is that it is backed by CEPES.

The Ministry of Economy has supported this project through exhaustive studies to develop a useful tool for business internationalization. "RECIPES offers its service through an internet portal that provides various sections with information on legislation, statistics, regulations, a basic library, contacts with other countries, and general information about the sector," says Gloria González, head of RECIPES.

It also features an interactive section where not only social economy enterprises, but any company, can post international business opportunities such as exports, imports, partner searches, and serve as a meeting point and exchange of experiences. Companies also have access to online consulting on international business matters, among other services.

Euro-Mediterranean Network

When international issues are discussed, CEPES refers them to its counterpart organizations in France, Italy, Greece and Portugal, with which it has agreements and shares experience.

According to Carlos Lozano, head of the Euro-Mediterranean Network, "the project aims to strengthen, organize, support, and promote the activities of the Social Economy in the southern Mediterranean countries, so that they can adequately prepare for the integration into the free market that the area will have with Europe within ten years."