Livelihoods

Emergencies like covid, climate, and conflict can have a disproportionate impact on communities with more people and fewer resources. For those whose livelihoods are sustained through informal labor, a lockdown means no income. For others who have to leave everything behind in order to reach safety in a refugee or displacement camp, even those who had formal work at home may struggle to make ends meet without social protections like unemployment insurance.

We support and guide the establishment community-focused groups like Village Savings and Loans (see Our Work in Action, below) and Self-Help Groups, which can serve as social protection for those otherwise left unprotected. We also distribute cash—rather than goods—directly to those who need it, both as a short-term solution and a long-term investment. Learn more about our cash transfers work below.

More often than not, the people we work with already have jobs, but still struggle to become economically productive. They have no margin for error, no opportunity to save, and no insurance.

Time and again, the most effective poverty reduction methods are less about aid and more about enabling. We work with communities to find families who would most benefit from 14-month package of support that includes monthly cash transfers to meet basic needs, business skills training, and general coaching and advice. We also provide grants to fund income generation activities of their choice, backed up with a business plan.

The money is important here, but just as critical are the trainings provided in financial literacy, home savings management, and entrepreneurial skills that keep businesses thriving long after our initial work.

The communities that we work with are on the front lines of the climate crisis. Whether it’s the Sahelian zone of Chad and Niger or the flood plains of Bangladesh, many of the people we work with rely heavily on agriculture, fishing, and livestock for their livelihoods. Climate change has left them in a precarious position.

We’re supporting communities to build skills in Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA), adapting their farming systems to become more resilient in the face of a less-predictable climate. These practices  include the diversification of crop varieties, increasing access to improved farming skills and technologies, and strengthening links with the private sector to facilitate access to agricultural inputs from seeds, to new equipment such as solar water pumps.