Village Enterprise often conducts its programs in villages where no other nonprofit organizations operate.  Working in rural areas for Village Enterprise is a challenge as well as an opportunity.

We recently entered into the Kigorobya subcounty of Hoima, Uganda. The village is named Kyabasagazi II. It is 39kms (24 miles) away from Hoima town and home to 300 households. It borders Budongo Forest Reserve in the south of the forest, which is why it is part of our conservation and poverty alleviation program. The area is home to many ethnic groups, including Bagungu, Banyoro, Ukebu, Lugbara, and Alur tribes.

To give you a picture of the extremely poor conditions these households live in, 98% live in grass/mud huts, 90% are illiterate, and most children only complete school at the 4^th grade level. To these villagers, a moderately wealthy person owns one goat. Senior Director of Operations and Programs, Konstantin Zvereff comments, “This village is the poorest I’ve ever seen in Uganda.”

Village Enterprise was the first NGO to operate in the area and the first organization to work with the poor through business training, seed capital provision, and the Business Saving Group program. Being the first organization, the community was skeptical about Village Enterprise’s mission and motives, even after community introduction meetings and multiple visits to the area. In order to be part of the community, we worked with local leaders.  Even with their support and optimism about the program, many potential business owners were skeptical. They were confused about why they should be given “free capital” in the form of a grant instead of a loan. Additionally, there was a history of land grabbing and eviction in the region, so the program participants were fearful that Village Enterprise was here to take their land.

Many efforts were made by Business Mentor Mildred and the rest of the Village Enterprise Hoima staff team in order to calm these tensions and dispel false assumptions. During this time, some business owners like Margret Falayi appointed herself the group Spokesperson to voice the village’s concerns. We held a special meeting run by Senior Director of Operations and Programs Konstantin Zvereff, Associate Country Director Winnie Auma, and Hoima staff members. Konstantin reaffirmed how Village Enterprise works and how it gets funding from donors and foundation in the United States. Business owners asked key questions about timing and planning.  After Konstantin’s answers, they became hopeful and happy. Some even called themselves Village Enterprise Ambassadors.

On March 1^st  2013, the grant disbursement finally took place. The disbursement was led by Anne Olson, Director of African Operations.  Community members are now happy with Village Enterprise, believing the program deals with the root cause of poverty and conservation. Business Owners, after receiving the grant, started laughing and there was lots of excitement and fun.

Reflecting upon this experience, I have realized a few things. First of all, it is vital to have passion and hope in everything we do. Working with the ultra-poor requires a lot of patience, understanding, and commitment. It was a learning experience working in such an extremely rural community and we faced more challenges than normal. Nevertheless, the excitement and hope the business owners now have is a great reward.

Nicholas Businge
Field Coordinator

The second stop on the best field visit ever was to a group of huts in Ngora subcounty of Uganda. As we arrived, we were told that Margaret Aluka, the business mentor, wanted to mobilize just a few business groups from one of the villages to meet with us.  Instead, the business owners were adamant that they ALL wanted to come to share their stories.  And to demonstrate proof of their success, they also brought all of their livestock (as most in this group had livestock businesses) to the one compound where we were meeting.  This was by far, one of my favorite experiences here in Africa to date.  It was so cool to see everyone together with their businesses. It was equally rewarding to hear about their successes and challenges as they continue to work to improve their lives and those of their children.

It was also total madness!  Everyone maneuvered as best they could into their groups of three business owners, each with their animals in tow.  There was lots of baying from the goats and sheep and loads of squeals from piggies.

Once business owners were arranged into their business groups, stories of their trials and successes were shared and photos were taken.

There were also some baby sheep and goats that were so cute, including one sheep that had just been born 3 days ago.

And as always, there were the ever-present children there to observe all of the activity.

As the visit drew to a close, all of the business owners got together for a group picture. It was an experience I’ll truly never forget!

Kim Davis
Fellow

I recently had one of the most exciting field visits yet during my fellowship with Village Enterprise. My first stop was the Arapi market (pronounced Uh-rah-pie), which is about a 20 minute drive out of Soroti town in Uganda. It’s a large market that takes place on Thursdays, and is complete with produce, livestock, prepared food, housewares, hardware, and second-hand clothing.

My main objective was to visit some business owners who had diversified from their agricultural businesses to make baskets. The baskets are made from local materials, which mainly consist of local grasses and palm fronds. On market day, they are strapped to the back of bicycles and peddled to market. Transporting the goods can be a challenge, so some business owners have made arrangements to sell in bulk to people from Kampala who come with a big lorry (truck) to pick up large quantities all at once from the village.

The baskets were quite lovely. Some reminded me of Easter baskets and some were like big hamper-style baskets.

While being interviewed, the business owners were busy putting the finishing touches on their baskets. Since we took up a lot of their time, I felt I should buy something, so I went with one of the Easter baskets. I’ve actually seen this style of basket used in restaurants and bars here to carry sodas and beer to the tables for serving; maybe I can use it for something like that back home!

Afterwards, we went through the rest of the market and visited with other Village Enterprise business owners. Most of the businesses we saw were the second or third business endeavor for the owners.  This is very common to see because after making profits through their original businesses, business owners are able to borrow small loans from their business savings group (kind of like their local village bank) to diversify.

For Village Enterprise, this is a sign of great success. Not only have these men and women been able to lift themselves and their families out of extreme poverty, but also they have applied and re-applied the knowledge and skills they gained from our extensive training and mentoring program.  Diversifying their economic endeavors means they will be able to earn sustainable incomes now and in the future.  Additionally, the savings groups continue to offer the opportunity to take out loans so expansion and diversification are possible.

It was thrilling to see such positive results!

Kim Davis
Fellow

Dining for Women’s vision is to create a new paradigm for giving – collective giving on an immense scale while maintaining the intimacy of small groups with a focus on education and engaged giving. Communication Director Laura Haight reflects on how sustained program funding from Dining for Women will benefit Village Enterprise business owners.

As children, we all stood on the shores of ponds, lakes, and streams and threw stones across the water. How far could we reach? How many ripples could the force of our effort create?

It is that ripple effect that Dining for Women is generating – by leveraging the power of collective giving and supporting programs like Village Enterprises each month.

The life of a woman is changed when she can go from poverty and subservience to economic self-sufficiency. In starting a business, educating herself, and taking more control of her economic circumstances, she sets a positive example for her children. When a household has sustainable income, there are greater opportunities for better diet, health care, and the opportunity to keep children in school.

How are the lives of her children changed when they don’t die at an early age because they were malnourished and could not afford health care? When a daughter can look up to her mother and see a woman starting a business, becoming more self-assured, gaining economic influence and self-empowerment,  she can see herself in a new light.  She has new possibilities on her horizon that she did not imagine before.

Dining for Women is proud to have supported Village Enterprises for several years – this sustained grant, which will provide $45,000 over the next three years is the fourth time we have featured this program. The 180 women-led business groups will receive microgrants, business training, group mentoring and support for an entire year. That group of 540 women (3 per business) armed with education, a greater place in their village and society, and growing economic self-sufficiency can provide better opportunities for education, health care, self-sufficiency and economic sustainability for their immediate families – each touching roughly five more people.

The power of the ripple effect we start together is in the waves of change. Even if only half of the 2,700 people indirectly impacted by this grant have their lives changed,  as many as 18,750 children, grandchildren and great grandchildren will have the courses of their lives changed for the better, the opportunities for their futures redirected on a new and more empowering course.

Together, the force of our efforts will create ripples of impact for generations to come.

To learn more about Dining for Women’s sustained funding of Village Enterprise, please visit our website: www.diningforwomen.org
www.diningforwomen.org/VillageEnterprise2013

Laura Haight
Communications Director
Dining for Women

Margaret Aluka is working hard to improve the lives of the villagers in the Amuria and Ngora districts of Uganda.

Upon receiving her degree from the Uganda College of Commerce in Soroti in 1996, she joined the Youth With A Mission program, where she helped youth who had lost their parents to HIV/ AIDS, experienced domestic violence, or fell victim to the Lord’s Resistance Army.

When a friend told Margaret about Village Enterprise, she promptly applied for a position as a business mentor. In her ten years with Village Enterprise, Margaret witnessed many improvements to our program. She cites the significant increase in training and support given to mentors, along with the expansion in the business services provided entrepreneurs: formal business training, non-cash asset transfers (in the form of water pumps, for example) and, most recently, the formation of savings groups.  Each is leading to greater business success and higher profits for entrepreneurs.

The Mandazi Baking Group is as an example of a business that has thrived. They started as a small street-side mandazi (African donut) stand, and through hard work now supply many shops in town. Their growing profits allowed them to rent a shop to house their operations, and to purchase a bicycle to make deliveries. Their business profits have changed the lives of each family, too.

Notes Margaret, “They have enough food now, they can buy clothes, and their children can all go to school.”

Margaret and the dozens of dedicated mentors like her are transforming thousands of lives every year.

Board Member Tim Geisse came to know Village Enterprise as the managing trustee of a family foundation, The John F. and Mary A. Geisse Foundation, a supporter of Village Enterprise. The foundation focuses on economic development in developing countries. Tim recently visited our operations in Uganda as part of the Village Enterprise Vision Trip.

“Keep your tee shot to the right,” said my caddie on the 12^th tee at the Entebbe Golf Club, “because left is out of bounds”.  “Why, what’s over there,” I joked, “Lions?”   “No”, he said, straight-faced, “Rhinos.”  Sure enough, before we hit our second shots, we saw two Rhinos peacefully grazing on the other side of a distinctly less than “rhino-proof” chain link fence.

On my first hole of the Lira golf course, I asked my playing partner where to aim since there were no flags marking the holes.  “Just aim past the second ant hill,” he replied.  (African ant hills are huge, unlike anything we have here.)   Sure enough, just past the second ant hill, there was a hole in the ground.  There was nothing else to identify a “green.”

African golfers face challenges that we could not even imagine on an American golf course.   The same harsh environment gives African farmers challenges that American farmers have not faced in generations, if ever.   I imagine I could get used to the challenges of Africa golf: bare spots, ants and tufts of dried yellow grass on the fairways, no sand in the bunkers, no flags on the greens, and serious penalties for going out of bounds (maybe that would finally cure my slice!), but I cannot imagine adjusting to subsistence farming in Africa.  The people Village Enterprise works with in Uganda are in a struggle for survival in a harsh natural, social and political environment.

In the past 18 years of managing the John F. and Mary A. Geisse Foundation, I have traveled to many impoverished countries and visited many different poverty alleviation projects.  The people we visited on the Village Enterprise Vision Trip are among the poorest people I have encountered anywhere: houses made of sticks and mud, floors of cow dung, children wearing soiled and torn rags, if anything.   After observing a Business Mentor lead a community through a Participatory Wealth Ranking, it is clear to me that Village Enterprise targets and reaches the poorest people in a community.  It is also clear to me that the people who make it into the program are very happy with the support and the results.   Farmer after farmer proudly paraded his or her sheep, goats or pigs in front us, visible measures of the program’s impact.

Thank you for your support of Village Enterprise.  I can assure you that your donations are reaching and helping some of the neediest people on the planet.

Tim Geisse
Board Member

I have been working with Village Enterprise in San Carlos as Office Manager/Executive Assistant for six months. That means everything from coordinating meetings for committees and executive staff to assisting the development team in fundraising efforts. From the very beginning, I have felt honored to be part of such a dynamic organization with dedicated, bright colleagues.

During my time here I have learned a great deal about the power that comes from microenterprise and how impactful Village Enterprise is in its poverty alleviation efforts. I know that what I am doing, despite being physically distant from our business owners and their families, makes a difference in their lives.

What drew me to Village Enterprise initially is our Peace and Business program. We are currently starting 80 women-led businesses in the Amoria region of northeast Uganda. Our business owners in this region were formally living in camps for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). The Ugandan government set up these camps in 1996, after the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), led by Joseph Kony, had been attacking Northern Uganda for several years. According to Invisible Children, Kony abducted more than 30,000 children in northern Uganda for his army by means of murder, rape and brainwashing.

I have assisted the field team in the creation of the newest version of our Peace and Business training manual, specifying it to the conflict in the Amoria area. Our team is currently incorporating this training to guide business owners on their way to starting sustainable, profit-generating businesses.

The training emphasizes the business owners’ working together to overcome their common traumatic experiences from the LRA conflict. At least two of the three business owners in each group are women. This creates an open space for them to remedy the trauma of their husbands fleeing the war, their children being abducted into the army, and living in the IDP camps. The exercises also work toward resolving conflicts that may arise in business ventures.

These business owners need a way to sustain themselves and their newly resettled families. The Peace and Business training teaches them that building sustainable economic and personal relationships between resettled people will create a peaceful and stable business climate. It highlights the concepts of peace and business as mutually beneficial.

Business is good for peace because it minimizes idleness and increases’s people’s responsibility toward each other; peace is good for business because it fosters economic growth, as opposed to conflict which hinders it.

Asante sana, Village Enterprise!

Ryah Belford
Office Manager & Executive Assistant

As the Director of Africa Operations for Village Enterprise, I have been fortunate enough to experience all of the different facets of our program that helps develop sustainable businesses.  After over a year of assisting our operations from the US office, I am happy to be back in Kenya and Uganda.

Last Wednesday, I went into the field in Uganda to see a couple of businesses that have received grinders.  A grinder works with millet, sorghum, gnuts (peanuts), simsim (sesame seeds), and maize.  The first business that I visited was in a trading center, which is a collection of businesses that meet in one place.  The business owners were already doing well with their business and were making a profit. The second business I visited was out in a village.  It did not have as much traffic but they were getting more customers and more money each month!

After seeing the progress with the grinders, I went to visit my friend Hellen. I have known Hellen since my first visit to Soroti in 2006.  She received a grant from Village Enterprise in 1998.  When Hellen initially received her grant, she was on a verandah, mending clothes with her sewing machine.  Now she has a tailoring shop, a restaurant, and a catering business.  Hellen has new plans to buy a pickup and build a guesthouse!  She is an amazing entrepreneur and a very talented seamstress.

On Thursday, I visited some of our businesses that make beautiful baskets.  I really wanted one of the big baskets but just could not figure out how to get one home!  Afterward, I went into the market to visit other business owners that we have worked with.  One of them told us that they were doing  just what they had been told to do – business, business, business!  I think they internalized the training that we gave them.

One of central things Village Enterprise does is help business owners set up Business Savings Groups (BSG).  Businesses Savings Groups encourage and allow the poor to save money for borrowing when needed.  One of the basket makers that we visited Thursday morning had taken a loan from the BSG to open another business in the market, where they would soon start selling supplies, such as plates and cups.  He was very proud of his new business, and I am proud to be a part of an organization that helps empower the poor to break out of the cycle of poverty, a cycle that may not end without the help of others.

Asante Sana!

Anne Olson
Director of Africa Operations

“To educate girls is to reduce poverty.” – Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan

March 8, 2014 marks the one hundred and fifth anniversary of International Women’s Day!  This is an exciting day to celebrate the experiences of women around the globe.

According to a UN Report, women make up 70 percent of the worlds poor and own only 1 percent of titled land.  This study also indicates that, “when women hold assets or gain income, the money is more likely to be spent on nutrition, medicine and housing, and consequently their children are healthier.”  Women are an integral part of society, yet in many places around the world they are not treated as such.

Since its inception in 1987, Village Enterprise has started over 25,000 businesses and has improved the lives of more than 600,000 women, men, and children.  Village Enterprise continually strives to empower and encourage the development of women.  Over two-thirds of Village Enterprise’s business owners are women.  After participation in the Village Enterprise program, 84 percent of woman report having a greater sense of empowerment.  With increased incomes generated by their microenterprises, ninety-five percent of families in our program have the financial capabilities to send their children to school, an increase of 40 percent.

At Village Enterprise we believe in a world free of inequality.   We are committed to working toward our vision of a world free of extreme poverty and chronic hunger where people have the means to sustain their families.  Village Enterprise is making tangible steps to see our vision come alive.

We are participating in International Women’s Day by celebrating with our business owners in Uganda and Kenya!  At Village Enterprise we are excited to see our program help women build sustainable businesses that not only support their families but also help them thrive!

Courtney Arrington
Marketing and Event Planning Intern

Hope can be lost but it can also be found.

I first lost my hope some years ago. Sitting in my small mud hut, holding my son close to my chest, I was unable to provide the food he so desperately cried for.  In the midst of what seemed to be a never-ending war initiated by the Lord’s Resistance Army, I did not know how we would survive.

Two years ago Village Enterprise helped me find my hope by providing me and the other women of the newly-formed Wat Ber business with 200,000 shillings (about $150) along with business and savings training.

Our business mentor Vicky helped us write a business plan and we used the seed capital to buy three goats.  We have taken good care of our goats, providing them with food, water and medicine and in return they have provided us with many kids – last year two of our goats had triplets! We now have a total of 32 goats and each one fetches around $50 at the market.

This income allows us to pay school fees for our children and provide them with better meals, healthcare, and clothing.  We make sure to save some of our profits and to reinvest in our goat businesses.  We have built a corral to keep our goats safe and have hired 3 people to help tend to the animals and take them to market.

Today my son had too much energy to hold him close.  He loves helping care for the goats and is anxious to begin school next year.  Looking at him now, my heart overflows with hope.

Thanks to Village Enterprise, I know I will never lose this feeling again.

Asante sana,
Josephine Achan
Village Enterprise Business Owner