Two survivors of armed conflict in Antioquia overcome each other and to that end they undertook their own business thanks to a micro franchise project with a focus on reparation and social inclusion for victims. This 9th of April marks the 'National Day of Memory and Solidarity with the Victims of Armed Conflict'.

The Catando Café store that Natalia Alejandra Garro and Luz Miriam Giraldo opened six months ago earns customers day after day attracted by the aroma of gourmet coffee and the variety of other healthy products.

What they do not know is that, more than a business that has just started in the Antioquia municipality of Rionegro, these varied warm and hailed cups are also filled with the resilience of two women determined to forge new life projects that leave behind in the past painful experiences caused by violence.

More than victims of conflict, they appear as survivors who become enterprising women. That is why the last 12 months have been intense for them, training in business administration and learning the exact mix of ingredients in espresso machines.

For them "it has not been easy to start and respond to the obligations, but we are already on this project and this is a great opportunity to continue forward because we cannot remain alone in the victimization".

After suffering forced displacement in Chocó with her family when she was just a girl, now Natalia is motivated "to want to own our own dream, our own business and that opportunity will take us to achieve other goals such as economic independence and improve our quality of life”.

Almost 25 years ago she fled displaced with her family from Carmen de Atrato, after the guerrillas entered a rural area and intimidated several families to leave their land. She says that "one day they came and told us: 'they have to go'". To be safe "We had to leave with my parents and my brothers and take the road at midnight without being able to take anything, in flip flops, because they did not leave us or make suitcases".

For her part, Luz Miriam, her partner in this venture, was the victim of forced displacement of San Rafael municipality after the murder of her husband by an illegal armed group. She had to flee because they also intended to recruit her two minor children.

"This process of being enterprising is repairing because it has allowed us to heal many of the painful experiences we lived and to overcome the fears that one faces when she has to leave displaced and finds himself with a different world," says the woman, recalling the difficulties of uprooting she suffered.

The impetus to start training as entrepreneurs was a year ago when they learned about a micro franchise project of National Government to promote the entrepreneurship of the population affected by armed conflict.

Victims supporting victims

The project involved an investment of $ 653 million after a call from the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism, operated by INNPULSA Colombia, whose bid was won the alliance among the Unit for Comprehensive Attention and Reparation for Victims in Antioquia, the firm Expansión and Business Management and the Chamber of Commerce of Aburrá South.

As a successful result, 30 victims in Antioquia now own 15 new businesses with a focus on reparation and support from three franchising companies of businessmen consolidated in the market. They, in turn, also suffered violence.

It's about Café Arangos, the House of Didactic and Technology and Cafetos del Cedral. Of commercial brands of each of these firms, 5 productive units were created, each with two associated victims.

The 30 survivors benefited with this project were selected after a call in different regions of Antioquia by the Victims Unit, which also provided them with psychosocial attention to guarantee their emotional conditions to start their businesses.

In addition to these beneficiaries, other victims saw in the micro franchises an opportunity to begin their productive projects by investing the financial compensation they received from the Victims Unit.

For the director of Victims Unit in Antioquia, Wilson Córdoba Mena, these public-private partnerships "are fundamental for overcoming vulnerability with the generation of profitable and sustainable businesses as part of reparation to the victim population not only with micro franchises, but in many fields, so that they have real projects to rebuild their life projects”.

From then on, after opening the doors of her own business, Natalia Alejandra and Miriam have the support of businessmen and institutions, in order to take advantage of the transfer of knowledge. Also, the experience and resilience of those people who also suffered violence in their own flesh and have already walked the path of improvement that they now undertake.

That walk is well known by Piedad Cárdenas, manager of Cafetos El Cedral, one of the three franchising companies and owners of Catando Café brand, the same one that Natalia and her partner adopted to start their own business.

With her family she was displaced from Huila in an area hit by the guerrillas. In addition to the growth opportunity of the company they created in 2004, it also motivates her to support other victims to achieve great goals: "We have in common that we have experienced violence, but we want to turn difficulties into opportunities by generating employment and opportunities for victim families. You have to do duels and overcome yourself ".