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(EDP) in and has made a big difference in helping people with disabilities start and expand their businesses. With 16 rural offices in Manitoba and 13 rural offices in Saskatchewan, the program has particularly helped those in rural communities across the two provinces.

Community Futures Manitoba and Saskatchewan have had a long partnership with the Neil Squire Prairie Regional Office in Regina, Saskatchewan, often referring their clients to our Digital Jumpstart program to help them raise their computer skills and get them the necessary supports to get online.

“We’ve had a great partnership with Neil Squire in Regina [. . .], if we have any rural entrepreneurs with disabilities that are looking for supports, we’re able to send that referral on, and then they are able to access that service,” says Manitoba and Saskatchewan EDP program manager Susan Bater.

Digital Jumpstart has helped rural entrepreneurs with disabilities to start, grow, and maintain their businesses, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“During COVID, being digitally literate was key, especially for our small business owners. A lot of our small business owners relied on traffic up and down their main streets, or word of mouth. While all of a sudden, especially when we had lockdowns [. . .], these entrepreneurs need to get online, and a lot of them didn’t have access, may not have had the funding, especially during COVID, to put out those dollars for some of their internet costs. They may not have had the equipment they needed, and they all benefited from the training. And the training was exceptional because the training is always meeting the entrepreneur where they’re at,” Bater explains.

“It was a really personalized service, which worked really, really well, and benefitted the entrepreneurs both for their business and personally in a time where we all needed to be online even more so than before.”

Digital Jumpstart also helps their clients access services from Community Futures in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, many of which shifted from in-person to online during the pandemic.

“It’s a great partnership in that way, because Neil Squire was able to provide the tools and the training, and that allowed them to access the services we were able to offer,” says Bater. “Even if they didn’t use it specifically for their business, we wanted them to know how to take a Zoom call, how to access the webinars and things, and without that computer training they wouldn’t have been able to access a whole range of online services.

“I think we just want to say a huge thank you. The program’s been amazing, it’s really made a huge impact, and we couldn’t have done it without Neil Squire.”