Help an At-Risk Family Become Self-Sufficient

A Small Business Helps End a Family’s Poverty

Having a reliable way to generate their own income is essential for a family that lives on the edge. Stabilizing a family will help them survive. But only generating their own income will allow them to start moving along the path towards financial independence — and a future full of opportunities.

The type of small business will vary, depending on where the family lives. It might be a market stall, or some rooms they build in their home and rent out, or farming. It doesn’t matter what the business is. What matters is the pride and satisfaction that come from being able to support your own family.

Our Financial Empowerment Programs

Ethiopia / Guatemala / Burundi

When they’re stable enough and able to take on a small business, all families in our Family Preservation programs can receive a small business grant. We train them to navigate the financial world, helping them complete applications, learn about financial management, set up bank accounts, create business plans. We act as business advisors, providing whatever help a family needs.

In Ethiopia, where almost 90% of our program households are headed by women, these mothers can join a Self-Help Group (SHG) instead of receiving a grant. SHGs are a deceptively simple initiative that has proven time and again that the simple act of gathering women together in a group has powerful financial — and psychosocial — benefits. Groups hold weekly meetings where the women prepare coffee and talk — about their households, families, neighbors, and a possible business — and make a small deposit into the group savings fund. Participants can then borrow from this fund to start or expand their business, paying their loans back as their businesses permit. After a few years in a SHG, many members have taken out and repaid a number of loans — and also become financially stable. Mothers can stay in a SHG for as long as they like — and most choose to stay because of the strong bonds they have formed with the other women there.