SAN JOSÉ, Costa Rica — Huawei values investing in youth, and sees one of its more important mandates being student development. And so for its main corporate social responsibility programme, over the week of October 9 to 16, it brought together 92 students from Central America and the Caribbean for Seeds for the Future 2023, part of a target to grow the information and communication technology (ICT) pool in the region.

“Our first motivation is connectivity. We want to maintain an interconnected people,” said Carolina Herrera, communication manager of Huawei Central America and Caribbean. She explained that the company is also focused on digital talent and the environment – to enhance the knowledge in the digital industry, and make the environment more of a focus as far as protection, monitoring and preservation.

Huawei has developed several products along with Seeds for the Future – there are ICT academies almost in every country in the region; a WomenInTech programme to promote education for women in technology; and TECH4ALL, a long-term digital inclusion initiative and action plan to provide innovative technologies and solutions that make the world a more inclusive and sustainable space.

A leading provider of infrastructure and smart devices, the Chinese company has invested heavily in the region, with over 1,500 young people already having been trained.

Herrera told journalists in Costa Rica on October 14 that the company’s vision and mission is to bring digital to every person, home and organisation for a fully connected, intelligent world.

This thrust has meant wide recognition of Huawei’s sustainability efforts, towards, among other things, 600 plus schools benefiting from its TECH4ALL programme; 46 protected areas worldwide benefited from Huawei technology; and 2.4 million digital professionals cultivated.

She explained that the company invests more than 10 per cent of earnings in research and development, in its bid to keep on top. It has more than 120,000 active patents in the telecoms industry, and has achieved international recognition mainly because of the development of research and development.

Herrera outlined that in the Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region the company is a trusted and reliable partner to go digital, connecting the unconnected, bridging the digital divide, providing ICT training, and connecting schools. The company has been a partner in the LAC region for over 20 years.

“Many have heard of Huawei on the subject of cellphones, but Huawei is a company that goes much further,” Herrera said.

With more than 207,000 employees globally, offices in most of the countries in the region, and local employees in every country in the region, there is focus on training and developing employees.

There are also three open labs or innovation centres to teach employees and students in Mexico, Panama and Brazil, and 13 customer solution innovation and integrating centres.

“As a leading company in the technology, information and communication sector, we understand the importance of investing in technology development and that is why more than 55 per cent of employees are dedicated to research and development,” she added.

LAC remains the most unequal region in the world when it comes to education, and COVID has worsened the educational conditions. Closing this gap means driving equity and quality in education to benefit remote communities and disadvantaged groups, Herrera said.

As such, growing the ICT talent pool in the LAC region involves talent programmes like Seeds for the Future, the longest lasting CSR initiative which was first brought to LAC in 2014, starting with Colombia. It has since expanded to cover 20 countries in the region and by the end of 2022, some 1,500 young students in the region had been awarded scholarships.

“We believe that we can contribute greatly to local communities by working hand in hand with our customers, partners and stakeholders since we all share the same vision of wanting to promote the digital transformation of our region. To achieve this the most important thing is to invest in talent, training future generations with technical skills and business tools. [This] is the most important step we have identified to build a robust technological ecosystem,” said Daniel Ding, VP of Public Affairs and Communications for Huawei Latin America and the Caribbean.