Gawad Kalinga Founder Tony Meloto Welcomed by French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysée

Gawad Kalinga founder Tony Meloto with French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysée Palace. Mr. Meloto is holding a copy of the December 2016 issue of French magazine Acteurs de l’économie which has Mr. Marcon on the cover. On page 1 of the magazine is an article by Mr. Meloto.

07 September 2017 PARIS — Gawad Kalinga (GK) founder Antonio “Tony” Meloto was welcomed by President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysée Palace on 1 September 2017, at the sidelines of the Convergences World Forum held in Paris from September 05 to 07.

Mr. Meloto was one of the keynote speakers at the Convergences Forum, which is the first “platform for thought” in Europe aimed at building convergences between public, private, and solidarity-based actors to promote the Sustainable Development Goals and the development of a world of 3Zs: Zero Exclusion, Zero Carbon and Zero Poverty.

Instead of attending the Forum, which welcomes over 7,000 participants each year, President Macron invited some of the Forum’s speakers, including Mr. Meloto, to the Elysée Palace for a reception.

During their brief exchange, Mr. Meloto told President Macron about GK and how it has become the single biggest destination of French volunteers and interns in Asia.

In 2017 alone, GK will have welcomed 275 French volunteers and interns. These interns, which come from the top French universities, volunteer in different GK villages, including the GK Enchanted Farm in Angat, Bulacan, to help GK communities develop social enterprises. 

“It is surprising how two countries which do not have strong cultural and historical ties have so much mutual affection. I think we can attribute this to the fact that both the Philippines and France share one thing in common: we are both hubs for social innovation. The Philippines is the hub in Asia and France is the hub in Europe," Mr. Meloto told President Macron.

GK is the largest NGO in the Philippines with over 3,000 villages in the country as well as the first university dedicated to social entrepreneurship called the School of Entrepreneurial and Experiential Development (SEED).

In February 2017, the SEED welcomed its first batch of French students. They will welcome their second batch this month for the fall semester.

For more information, visit www.parispe.dfa.gov.ph or http://www.facebook.com/PHinFrance/ https://twitter.com/PHinFrance. END