Business Parks EoC
One of the key ideas behind Chiara Lubich’s first intuitions about the EoC was to develop business parks. Her proposal was to set them up close to the little towns of the Focolare Movement where there would be a grouping of various enterprises acting as a working model and inspiration for other EoC businesses.
Business Park Spartaco
Business Park Solidaridad
Business Park Solidar
Business Park Lionello
Business Park Ginetta
The Box
Business Park Giosi Guella
Business Park Mariapoli Faro
Business Park Solidaridad
B6748 O'Higgins, Buenos Aires, Argentina
In July 1991, two months after the birth of the EoC in Brasil the entrepreneurial pole "Solidaridad" was created next to Mariapolis Lia, on 34 hectares of land.
An Ltd. named UNIDESA (Unità e Sviluppo - Unity and Development) was constructed in order to manage the Pole, to create the conditions necessary for the moving in of businesses that would render the Economy of Communion Project more visible.
Those who wish to participate follow the indication “we are poor but we are many” and are offered a possibility of shareholding by nominal values so that everyone can participate.
In 1995 a residential area was created for the families that wished to move in there, taking up part of the land (about 5 hectares), and the necessary infrastructures were also provided (water, light, telephone etc.) for the companies.
Year after year thousands of visitors come and visit the Pole to get to know the cultural aspect of the project and the related businesses.
Further information: 
www.polosolidaridad.com
Business Park Spartaco
Estrada da Água Espraiada, 5480, Água Espraiada – Cotia – SP CEP: 06726-400 Brasile
Since the inception of the EoC in 1991, Chiara Lubich had imagined the birth of businesses in the vicinity of the small towns of the Focolare Movement. Such businesses would be polo-spartaco.jpg housed by Business Parks that would stand as proof to the Economy of Communion and would serve as points of reference for all the businesses who would be adhering to the EoC in that specific territory.
Named after Spartaco Lucarini , the Spartaco Business Park was the first to be constructed in the succeeding years. It was established in the vicinity of the Mariapoli Araceli, now known as Ginetta, in Cotia (SP).
A group of experts started Espri S.A. a stock corporation (with about 4000 stockholders at present) which took care of acquiring the land and of constructing the buildings for the businesses which had decided to establish themselves at the Business Park. Since then the company manages the Business Park. They rent out the spaces to the businesses and provide them a host of services as well.
The Association of employees of businesses of Spartaco Business Park was formed with the aim of improving the quality of life of its members, presently numbering to about a hundred. The Association offers medical and dentistry services, microcredit, sports, cultural and other activities.
Polo Solidar
: Solidar, Aarschotsesteenweg 33, 3110 Rotselaar Belgium
Business park Lionello Bonfanti
Loc. Burchio snc, 50063 Figline e Incisa Valdarno (FI)
“God acts always” is the motto which Chiara Lubich gave to the Polo Lionello “to remind ourselves of the value which God gives to work, to man´s own creative ingenious”. It´s written on a plaque (sculpted by Benedetto Pietrogrande) hung near the building´s reception area.
(click on the image to zoom)
The Italian business park, inaugurated in October of 2006, is located in Incisa Val D´Arno, a few kilometers from the international small town of Loppiano (near Florence). The naming of the building after Magistrate Lionello Bonfanti, once responsible for the small town´s relationships with the local institutions, was in order to highlight that the building´s “vocation” is not only economic but “civil” as well. In fact, the 20 businesses (see below) there today present themselves as a community open to the region that has welcomed them and of which they are a living part.
Already from inauguration day (see photo of the inauguration) this characteristic has stood out through the presence of numerous civic and academic personalities, leaders of associations and institutions, among which are the then President of the Italian Council, Romano Prodi.
The dialogue, intensified during the visit of Dr. Claudio Martini, President of the Region of Tuscany and regional councilor of international cooperation Dr. Massimo Toschi, continues to be fruitful.
It is a very intense dialogue, involving various types of associations, particularly cooperatives that often hold their own meetings in the halls of the pole.
The center is also often full with people of the academic and formational circles, including university lecturers, visits from high schools, internships for entire classes, and specialized courses given by the EdiC SPA (the association which runs the building), which is accredited by the Tuscan region.
The 5640 shareholders of the business park Lionello Bonfanti are witnesses of how many have believed in the project and have in some way wanted to make themselves protagonists despite the fact of not being entrepreneurs. A photograph of them would well describe the “poor but many” which Chiara Lubich once spoke about while describing the origins of the Economy of Communion.
The EdiC spa was instituted on October 13, 2001, and owes its name Lubich who was its first shareholder (see photo of the inauguration).
Today, the administrating council has ten members who will hold their office until December 31, 2008.
The park is also indebted to the many who offered their own sufferings and even their lives for its realization. In the name of all of them, we mention Iliana Pieri, who was the first to agree to insert her business there. The seminar hall has been dedicated to her and her husband Giovanni. (see photo of the inauguration).
Album: click on photos to enlarge
To page through the album: click on the right side of the photo to go ahead, click on the left side of the photo to go back.
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Business park Ginetta Recife
Estrada do Monjope, 5100 Cruz de Rebouças Igarassu – PE Cep: 53.645 - 337 (Brasile)
Address: (Mariápolis Santa Maria)
Av. Alfredo Bandeira de Melo, 01
Ana de Albuquerque Igarassu – PE
Cep: 53.630-030 Brasile
