The Need

• The Need
• Our Program
• Our Unique Approach
• Conservation
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• Value Chain Development

Village Enterprise has made a strategic decision to direct its poverty alleviation efforts on people living in extreme poverty in rural, sub-Saharan Africa. In 2009, the proportion of sub-Saharan Africans living on less than US$1.25 a day was just below 50 percent, the highest of any region in the world. Furthermore, the vast majority of these people live in rural, underserved communities.

• While the global number of people living in extreme poverty (income of less than $1.25 day) decreased between 1990 and 2005, it increased in sub-Saharan Africa, from 227 to over 388 million people.
• The share of the world’s poor living in Africa rose from 11 percent in 1981 to 27 percent in 2005.
• An estimated 22.5 million people were living with HIV in sub-Saharan Africa at the end of 2009, including 2.3 million children. During 2009, an estimated 1.3 million Africans died from AIDS. Almost 90% of the 16.6 million children orphaned by AIDS live in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Conflict in sub-Saharan Africa has resulted in over 9 million refugees and internally displaced people in 2008.
• Over 80% of the population of sub-Saharan Africa does not have access to quality, secure, reliable, convenient and cost effective financial services. Lack of access to these services is a key constraint to economic growth, private sector development and poverty reduction in this area.