Draft:Village Enterprise

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This page is about the nonprofit organization. For the educational program known as Enterprise Village, see Stavros Institute.
Village Enterprise
Founded1987 (1987)
FocusEconomic development
Location
Area served
Africa
MethodGraduation Approach
Key people
  • Dianne Calvi (CEO)
  • Katie Boland (Chair of the Board of Directors)
  • Brian Lehnen (Co-founder)
  • Joan Hestenes (Co-founder)
Staff
440+
Websitewww.villageenterprise.org

Village Enterprise is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that equips women, refugees, and youth living in extreme poverty to launch climate-smart businesses and saving groups in Africa. Locally-led and community-based, it equips these populations to adapt to the shocks of drought, climate change, displacement, and conflict. Its mission is to “end extreme poverty in rural Africa through entrepreneurship, innovation, and collective action.”[1]

As of December 2023, Village Enterprise has started over 80,000 businesses, trained over 274,000 first-time entrepreneurs, and positively impacted the lives of over 1,656,000 people in Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Congo-Brazzaville, Mozambique, and Tanzania.[2]

How it works[edit]

The Village Enterprise poverty graduation model is a one-year graduation approach that targets households living below the international poverty line and provides: access to a savings group, business training, a seed capital grant, and business mentoring. Each seed capital grant is a US$180 cash transfer given to groups of three entrepreneurs who launch a business together.[3] The positive impacts of the graduation approach and the rigorous evidence that supports it were highlighted by Nicholas Kristof in his 2015 New York Times article “The Power of Hope is Real.”[4]

A randomized controlled trial published in 2022 by IDinsight found the Village Enterprise program had a positive and statistically significant impact on both indicators it measured: monthly consumption and net assets.[5][6] It also estimated the Village Enterprise program to have a 534% lifetime benefit-cost ratio, meaning for every $1 invested into the program, $5.34 of income is generated by their entrepreneurs.[7] A previous randomized controlled trial by Innovations for Poverty Action that was published in 2018 and written about in Vox found that the Village Enterprise program led to increases in consumption, assets, income, as well as improvements in nutrition and subjective wellbeing of business owners and their families.[8][9]

History[edit]

Village Enterprise was co-founded in 1987 by Brian Lehnen and Joan Hestenes to show how "entrepreneurship can help the very poor create businesses and experience the dignity of long-lasting jobs."[10] For the first several years, Village Enterprise remained a small, volunteer-run organization.[11]

Village Enterprise hired its first outside CEO, Dianne Calvi, in 2010. Because of her impact at Village Enterprise, Calvi was honored with the President’s Award for the Advancement of the Common Good from Stanford University in 2023.[12]

In 2017, Village Enterprise launched a Development Impact Bond (DIB), the first for poverty alleviation in sub-Saharan Africa. When the results were released in 2022, the Village Enterprise DIB was shown to have succeeded, despite being implemented during the Covid-19 pandemic. The randomized controlled trial conducted by IDinsight estimated the program would generate lifetime impacts of more than $21 million for communities, around four times the overall cost of the project.[13]

Recognition[edit]

In 2021, Village Enterprise was named a winner of the Larsen Lam ICONIQ Impact Award for Refugees for its DREAMS (Delivering Resilient Enterprises and Market Systems) model.[14] DREAMS combines Village Enterprise's poverty graduation program and Mercy Corps' market systems development approach.[15] In 2023, Village Enterprise and Mercy Corps were awarded Fast Company's World Changing Ideas Award for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa for DREAMS.[16]

Also in 2023, Village Enterprise received a $7 million donation from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott.[17] That same year, the Kenyan newspaper Daily Nation published an article about the impacts of Village Enterprise's work on an entrepreneur named Salome Lodis.[18]

As of February 16, 2024, Village Enterprise has a four-star, 100% rating by Charity Navigator[19] and a platinum seal of transparency from Candid.[20]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "2023 Annual Report | Village Enterprise". 2023annualreport.villageenterprise.org. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  2. ^ "Refugees fleeing Somali civil war receive grants, training, and market access to become entrepreneurs". Village Enterprise. 2023-12-12. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  3. ^ "Our Model". Village Enterprise. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  4. ^ Kristof, Nicholas (2015-05-21). "Opinion | The Power of Hope Is Real". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  5. ^ "Village Enterprise Development Impact Bond Evaluation Findings". IDinsight. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  6. ^ Saldinger, Adva (2022-03-08). "Development impact bond in Uganda, Kenya hits targets despite COVID-19". Devex. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  7. ^ McManus et al. “Can poverty graduation programs make poor households more resilient during shocks? Evidence from Kenya and Uganda during COVID-19”. p. 23
  8. ^ "The Impact of Variations of Ultra-Poor Graduation Programming in Uganda". Innovations for Poverty Action. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  9. ^ Matthews, Dylan (2018-10-15). "Giving out cash is a great way to fight poverty. This approach might be even better". Vox. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  10. ^ Maslow on Management, Abraham Maslow, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., p. 138
  11. ^ "Our Story". Village Enterprise. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  12. ^ Adami, Chelcey (2023-06-05). "Stanford alumni honored for work advancing the common good". Stanford Report. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  13. ^ Saldinger, Adva (2022-03-08). "Development impact bond in Uganda, Kenya hits targets despite COVID-19". Devex. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  14. ^ "Larsen Lam ICONIQ Impact Award". Larsen Lam ICONIQ Impact Award. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  15. ^ "DREAMS: A bold, new model for lasting change". Mercy Corps. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  16. ^ Hernandez, Andrea Paola. "This program is helping hundreds of refugees start their own businesses". Fast Company. Retrieved 2024-02-02.
  17. ^ Browley, Jasmine (2023-04-03). "A $7M Donation From MacKenzie Scott Is Poised To Help End Hunger For 20 Million People In Africa". Essence. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  18. ^ Esipisu, Isaiah (2023-08-14). "Building climate resilience through village-based banks". Nation. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  19. ^ "Charity Navigator - Rating for Village Enterprise". www.charitynavigator.org. Retrieved 2024-02-16.
  20. ^ "Village Enterprise Fund, Inc. - GuideStar Profile". www.guidestar.org. Retrieved 2024-02-16.


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