Economic empowerment

When we first partner with a community, we focus on the most immediate needs, like access to nutritious food, clean water, and healthcare. Then we address longer-term needs like livelihoods — including skills training, community-managed savings groups, and microloans, all of which help fuel the local economy and lead to sustainable progress.

We train people to start and grow small businesses, improve farming methods, and work together to form cooperatives. This helps parents become better providers for their children — so those children can grow up better nourished, better educated, and better equipped to break the generational cycle of poverty.

We help communities solve economic problems by investing in their entrepreneurial spirit through microfinance, savings groups, and market/value chain development.

• Microloans provide individuals and groups with the opportunity to start or grow a business. These loans were $551 on average in FY21 and are repaid at remarkably high rates — 97% in FY21. World Vision donors provide the capital for the loans, which are managed and disbursed through VisionFund International, World Vision’s microfinance subsidiary. Once the loans are repaid, they are recycled back into the community — often to the same people, who continue to expand their businesses and provide jobs for others in the community.
• Through savings groups, we train community members — whose low incomes often disqualify them from traditional banking services — to save money on a regular basis. These groups of 15 to 25 members meet weekly to put money into a joint savings account, from which they take turns borrowing. The savings also provides a safety net against economic shocks like family illness, weather-related disasters, and more.
• Instead of farming just to feed their families, many subsistence farmers want to do more. They want to meet the demand for crops, livestock, or products in bigger and more distant markets. We train farmers to form producer groups, select suitable products, improve the value of their products, and negotiate for better prices.

Breaking the poverty cycle is a complex, multisectoral process that varies greatly between countries and even communities. However, it’s always true that a child’s parents have the greatest influence on their child’s economic well-being. Our strategy focuses on helping individual households improve their incomes, helping to break the poverty cycle within that family and, consequently, their community.

Through support like microloans, savings groups, business and agricultural training, and market/value chain development, World Vision empowers individuals to start their own businesses, learn and practice savings habits, and improve their incomes, all of which enables them to better provide for their families.

While breaking the poverty cycle does not rely entirely on families improving their economic well-being, the encouragement a family receives from having their own business and being self-sustaining is instrumental to transforming the lives of their children, other families in their community, and the community as a whole.

Microfinance is the provision of financial services, such as microloans, to low-income individuals who do not qualify for typical banking services. Microloans involve lending small amounts of money to small business owners or farmers — especially women. These loans are designed to increase business incomes while being affordable for borrowers. When you donate through World Vision to provide a microloan, that loan is managed and disbursed through World Vision’s microfinance subsidiary, VisionFund. When a loan is repaid, the funds are recycled to help borrowers break the cycle of poverty for good.

• Hardworking low-income entrepreneurs, typically women with no credit history or collateral, apply for small loans to start or grow a business.
• The loan is managed and disbursed through World Vision’s microfinance subsidiary, VisionFund International.
• The entrepreneur makes payments until the loan is repaid in full.
• The repaid loan money recycles back into the community, funding additional loans.
• As the entrepreneur’s business grows, they are able to pay for food, medical care, clothing, and more for their families — things that improve the well-being of their children and help grow their community’s economy.