Gideon Maltz is the Executive Director of the Tent Partnership for Refugees (TENT). He previously served as deputy chief of staff to Ambassador Samantha Power at the U.S. mission to the United Nations; director of human rights and multilateral affairs at the U.S. National Security Council; and senior advisor to the Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development. Prior to government service, Gideon worked as an attorney in the international trade practice of Hogan Lovells and as a consultant at McKinsey & Company. Gideon has a BA from Yale and a JD from Stanford Law School.
Bancamia, joined TENT in 2019 and committed to providing loans, bank accounts and insurance products Venezuelan entrepreneurs in Colombia. These financial services, combined with financial education courses, will help support the growth of Venezuelan-owned small businesses in Colombia.
The COVID-19 health crisis is triggering devastating socioeconomic consequences throughout the globe. In particular, how is the pandemic affecting refugees and migrants that were already in a precarious situation?
Six months into the Covid-19 pandemic, the worst fears of the health threat to refugees have so far — almost miraculously — not come to pass. This has been thanks to the fantastic work of organizations such as the UN Refugee Agency, that have worked tirelessly to implement measures to keep refugees safe.
However, the economic impact on refugees around the world has been devastating, and it has laid bare the challenges that refugees in every society face in building productive new lives. Although many refugees have gone above and beyond to keep us safe and healthy – working on the frontlines of the pandemic as nurses, doctors, supermarket workers, and delivery drivers – many more worked in sectors, such as hospitality, that have been deeply affected by the financial crisis.
From working closely with NGOs on the ground, we know that in the U.S., for instance, 70% of refugees helped by these nonprofits have lost their jobs; whereas in Colombia, hiring of Venezuelan refugees is down 80% as a result of Covid. Not only has the economic dislocation been vastly greater for refugees than for the population overall, it has hit a community that has scant savings and, in many cases, one that doesn’t have the same access to government relief assistance and unemployment benefits.
From your perspective at Tent, what solutions or opportunities exist to mitigate these consequences?
Fundamentally, the disportionate impact of the economic crisis on refugees lays bare a longstanding challenge: that refugees face steep barriers to integrating into the economy where they live. That is, refugees have been far more likely to lose jobs and income than their compatriots because they had less access to decent jobs in the first place.
The business community has a critical role to play in addressing this challenge — in helping refugees integrate into the economy. Businesses can do this, for example, by helping refugees enter the workforce, by helping refugees start their own businesses, and by ensuring that refugees can access important commercial services, such as banking services.
We know there is a lot of momentum behind our cause – on October 6th, 28 major global companies including Bloomberg, Virgin Management, BNP Paribas and many others, joined the Tent Partnership, demonstrating their commitment to integrating refugees as economies begin to rebuild from Covid-19.
What are the main obstacles or needs that refugees have for their social and financial inclusion?
When a refugee resettles in a new country, they face a number of barriers. From a social perspective, refugees are unlikely to be fluent in the local language, or they may not understand local customs and traditions. Even seemingly simple things like shopping for food or enrolling their kids into school may be very different from how things are done in their country.
The same applies to the financial side. If a refugee has fled a warzone, they may not have the right documentation to open a bank account or get a loan to start a small business. (Or they may have the right documentation, but bank staff aren’t trained to recognize it!). Because in some cases they have been waiting to be resettled for many years, they are likely to have long, unaccounted for gaps in their resumes, or their skills might be out of date.
The good news is that in both the financial and social spheres, businesses can play a critical role in helping refugees better integrate into their host communities. Hamdi Ulukaya, the founder of the Tent Partnership for Refugees, often says that “the moment a refugee gets a job, it’s the moment they stop being a refugee”. That’s because once a refugee starts working, they make new networks and friends, they learn the local language much more quickly, and they have a way to support themselves and their families.
How can access to Microfinance help refugees and migrants thrive in their respective host countries?
Interestingly, refugees are more likely to start their own business than either immigrants and other nationals. In the U.S., for example, refugees are more than 40 percent more likely to start their own business than U.S.-born compatriots. This may be due to the fact that refugees are more likely to take risks and work incredibly hard to make their dreams a reality, given the circumstances they have escaped — or the fact that refugees face additional barriers in finding employment at other companies.
However, it’s often much more difficult for refugees to access finance in order to start their own small enterprises – so access to microfinance is critical. The work of Bancamia in Colombia is a great example of this. Bancamia committed to providing loans, bank accounts and insurance products to 200 Venezuelan entrepreneurs in Colombia, to help support the growth of Venezuelan-owned small businesses in the country.
Do you have an example of a country or government that has been particularly outstanding in the integration of refugees and migrants? What are the key policies or actions that have made this example a best case?
There are two good examples I’d like to reference, in two vastly different contexts. In Europe, Germany has done an outstanding job of integrating over 1 million refugees, many from Syria. A study published earlier this year found that 49% of refugees who have come to Germany since 2013 were able to find steady employment within five years of arriving. Germany has invested in language learning and broader integration programs to help refugees successfully become part of their communities.
Colombia is another example of a country that has shown great leadership in welcoming and including refugees. As the country hosting the largest number of Venezuelan refugees, Colombia grants Venezuelans the legal right to work, and has issued a number of work permits to facilitate the entry of Venezuelans into the formal labor market. The Colombian government has also worked closely with the business community to incentivize the hiring of refugees, and with local banks to increase financial inclusion among refugees in the country. Last year, Colombia also gave citizenship for over 24,000 undocumented children of Venezuelan refugees born in the country, making it easier for them to access education and healthcare.
About the Tent Partnership for Refugees
With more and more refugees displaced for longer periods of time, businesses have a critical role to play in helping refugees integrate economically in their new host communities. The Tent Partnership for Refugees mobilizes the global business community to improve the lives and livelihoods of 30 million refugees who have been forcibly displaced from their home countries. Founded by Chobani’s founder and CEO Hamdi Ulukaya in 2016, we are a network of over 130 major companies committed to including refugees. Tent believes that companies can most sustainably support refugees by leveraging their core business operations – by engaging refugees as potential employees, entrepreneurs and consumers.
