Economic Development Unit

CARE USA's policy on the creation of locally governed, self-sufficient enterprises that can provide sustainable services to the poor.
Program Related Investments can be initiated for the purpose of establishing enterprises that expand CARE USA's mission in a country.

Laté Lawson

Discusses the phases of creating a financial grid connecting Africa's microfinance institutions.

Lauren Hendricks: lhendricks@care.org

This assessment provides a review of the experiences to-date of identifying households
ready to exit the PSNP. This report describes the actual processes being followed in identifying
PSNP graduates, comments on the accuracy of these processes, and documents agreements
made by the Government of Ethiopia and its development partners on what changes may be
required to improve systems of graduate identification in the future.

theIDLgroup
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Article examining whether microfinance be effective in the context of sudden natural disasters or other emergencies. 

Presentation on CEP.

Farouk Jiwa: fjiwa@care.org

In 2008, CARE launched an ambitious Market Engagement Strategy that aims to empower 10 million women and
girls to transition from poverty to prosperity by 2015 by improving their ability to access and benefit from markets
and employment.

This report represents a first assessment of how we are doing. The report begins by recapping the rationale for our strategic focus and our objectives. This is followed by a summary of CARE’s global achievements and highlights from some of our most progressive programs and partnerships. The report also reviews current activities and concludes with an outline of key issues to focus on as we move forward.

This report examines CARE experience in the creation of independent institutions in Mozambique. Three related issues are addressed in the report.  The first is the value of the products provided by these two organisations to the chosen target group, the second is the challenge of sustainability (and what this means for service delivery and target group focus) and the third is the manner in which CARE facilitated the process of transformation.

Michelle Carter

CARE Bangladesh private sector partnership matrix as of August 2011.

CEP seeks to promote an African Enterprise Investment Fund. A core focus will be on social enterprises in the agricultural economy which will contribute to sustainable poverty reduction through wealth creation, enhanced economic opportunity and more efficient services to under served communities. The areas this document addresses are the project’s fund focus, fund structure, and investment strategy.

Sybil Chidiac- schidiac@care.org
farouk Jiwa- fjiwa@care.org

Document describes spectacular success of the IPO which was a milestone not only for Compartamos, but for microfinance.
Mainstream international fund managers and other truly commercial investors, not socially responsible investors, bought most of the shares. Still, the Compartamos offering has raised serious issues for many in the microfinance field and beyond, especially in view of the huge profits that it produced for Compartamos shareholders.

Microfinance Consumer Code of Conduct

Late Lawson

Codigo de conducta de CARE para la proteccion de los consumidores de micrfinanzas

Late Lawson llawson@care.org

The initiative demonstrates how development organizations can integrate market-based solutions for vulnerability reduction and create opportunities for low income communities to benefit from insurance services. CARE hopes to ensure equal opportunities in vulnerability reduction and strengthen household resilience towards better management of unexpected risk events. This publication captures the process by which proactive insurance claims were taken in small communities in India.

Helen Barnes: barnes@careinternational.org

The government of India started offering widespread crop in insurance in 1985, with the Comprehensive Crop Insurance Scheme. The CCIS has been replaced by the National Agriculture Insurance Scheme. The NAIS is considered to be an improvement over the CCIS, but it has simply replaced one flawed scheme with another slightly less flawed one. Government crop insurance has proved to be a failure worldwide, but India seems to have ignored both its own failure and the failure of other countries.

First edition of EconDevNews. Provides an introduction to the unit and upcoming events.

Sybil Chidiac- Schidiac@care.org

This edition of EconDevnews is focused on microfinance and  Women's Empowerment in Afghanistan and Niger, as well livelihood projects in Mali and Tanzania.

2001 and 2002 Quick Statistics of EDYFICAR in Peru

Guillermo Fajardo

Stategic impact study of CASHE, Credit and Savings for Household Enterprise, a CARE India microfinance initiative.

FAQs about working with villages.

Matt Hoover: 0245997942
Kelly Bidwell: 0243391300

The coastal districts of Cuddalore, Nagapattinam, and Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu state of southern India frequently suffer from weather-related natural disasters, such as seasonal flooding, which continually threaten livelihoods and the viability of local communities. Like most of the rural poor, residents of these communities lack access to social safety nets, which can mitigate some of the idiosyncratic and systemic risks and compensate for economic loss due to traumatic life-events including accidents, unemployment, or disability. In addition, extreme vulnerability to natural disasters due to the geographical and climatic conditions of the region places residents of coastal communities at tremendous risk of losing any accumulated wealth. With little or no access to formal credit, communities face increased dependency on informal, predatory lending as they repeatedly had to rebuild their livelihoods.

This innovation brief tells about an innovative market-based insurance program introduced by CARE which has successfully reached out to the poorest households in the coastal communities and secured their livelihoods by reducing vulnerability to natural disasters.

Presentation delivered at a conference in Brazil in which GVEP representatives proposed microfinance projects that would help poor women in developing countries.

This is a french dictionary/glossary of terms associated with microfinance.

Focused on establishing a risk financing system in Ethiopia that is closely linked to CARE Project PSNP. This document  provides substantial detail on the types of analysis and prediction methods that can be used to support index-based insurance schemes.

Christian Pennotti-cpennotti@care.org

This presentation evaluates the Kupfuma Ishungu Rural Micro Finance Programme.  It was presented July 5-7, 2006 at Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe.

This capacity statement highlights CARE’s market led approach and showcases current and recent economic development programs.

Late Lawson- llawson@care.org

MicroEnsure and Hollard Insurance Group have announced a global partnership to launch the worlds first “virtual cell captive” in order to implement affordable insurance solutions in developing markets.  The virtual cell captive will utilise Hollard’s balance sheet to underwrite a range of health, life and weather index risk across Africa and Asia; enabling products like health and weather index to be offered where previously underwriting capacity was a major constraint on market development.

A handbook for MicroInsurance Practitioners on Performance Indicators for MicroInsurance

Laté Lawson, Véronique Faber

The PSNP Plus, a USAID pilot program, is designed to assist poor, rural households that are taking part in
PSNP to earn more and build assets by improving their skills, and linking them to functioning markets and
sources of finance. The project places a lot emphasis on learning and dissemination of the lessons that
work in lifting HHs out of extreme poverty.

This presentation from FIELD Day 2009 - Food Security, Exploring New Pathways, provides an overview of the Productive Safety Net Program Plus in Ethiopia. The CARE-led initiative augments the government social safety net system with targeted services to support beneficiary graduation to food security though a combination of asset and cash transfers, VSLA formation, linkages to MFIs and market engagment. The Presentation focuses specifically on the linkages between financial services and food security.

The PSNP Plus programme aims at improving chronically food insecure households’
resiliency and asset base as a means to facilitate their graduation to food security.
Interventions under the programme are meant to improve participants‘ access to
microfinance services and to functional markets. Barriers to linking poor rural
households to markets and financial services are addressed in parallel by a
combination of interventions at household level and at environmental through the
development of value chains.

This final evaluation of the PSNP Plus project is aimed at: determining the overall impact of the project in terms of beneficiary graduation; identifying specific factors contributing to sustained graduation; assessing the efficiency and effectiveness of individual project components; and synthesizing lessons learned regarding replicability and scale-up. Particular focus is placed on identifying the specific successes and constraints of PNSP Plus components aimed at improving access to financial services, enhancing beneficiary participation in markets, enabling access to potable water, and facilitating development of more effective government and private sector strategies for market-based approaches to beneficiary graduation.

TANGO International

Report reviews PSNP Plus's innovative experiences by examining three methodologies: Rural Savings and Credit Facilities in East Wellega, VSLA, and a pilot project in Tigray. Lessons Learned and challenges are discussed, along with suggestions on how to improve the financial services that PSNP Plus offers.

Christian Pennotti- cpennotti@care.org

This document is a product of the PSNP risk financing mechanism design team. The team have been asked to prepare guidelines for the implementation of the risk financing mechanism. There are 8 sections in the paper and the following topics are addressed:  the origin of the risk financing mechanism, potential advantages of the risk financing mechanism,  overall design framework, including objectives, principles, and key features of the overall approach, and detailed design information on each of the four risk financing mechanism components: early warning, contingency planning, contingency financing, and institutions and capacity.

Christian Pennotti- cpennotti@care.org

The Rural Sales Program (RSP) is an initiative of CARE Bangladesh, started in 2004 as a pilot initiative under Rural Maintenance Program (RMP) with funding from CARE Canada to generate income and employment opportunity for the rural poor. It is an outcome of forging effective partnerships with private sector corporations that promise a Win-Win situation for all parties concerned. In this program a rural sales-force comprising of destitute women is created- these women are called "Aparajitas", a Bengali word that stands for "women who never accept defeat". The RSP initiative has proven to be a riveting example of how a private company can enter the rural markets and expand their business with the help of NGOs such as CARE- and at the same time engender socio-economic progress amongst rural people.

Asif U Ahmed- asif@carebangladesh.org

Framework, guide, and findings pulled together by SEEP regarding using Microfinance Institutions for energy lending. Spotlights on energy lending in Asia, Africa, and latin America and the Caribbean.

Explains how to navigate through EDU Sharepoint Website.

Shamim Noorani- Snoorani@care.org

Dictionary of terms associated with microfinance. One column is English and the other column is the Spanish equivalent.

A case study of a self-sustaining program created by Timberland with support from CARE in Bangladesh.

Descripes the PSP component of the Water and Sanitation Regional project – Innovative multi-sector alliances to promote access to W&S services for poor communities in Latin America. August 2006 – March 2008. Briefly includes aims and objectives, progress, and results to date.