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ADVANCING WOMEN’S ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT THROUGH FORMAL FINANCIAL SERVICES FOR SAVINGS GROUPS (LINK UP)

LINK Up, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, aimed to link 10,000 Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs) to formal financial institutions; building financial inclusion in Kenya and Tanzania, assessing the impacts of access to formal financial services on VSLAs and their
members and determining whether serving such groups presented a viable business case for financial service providers (FSPs).

Over the course of this program, LINK Up partners have opened 13,165 group savings accounts and have served approximately 322,000 members, 81% of which were women.
To implement LINK Up, CARE partnered with four financial service providers; co-designing and copromoting group products and alternative channel solutions tailored to the needs of savings groups and their members. The collaborations resulted in the creation of four new group-focused products and a host of innovations in the mobile and agent banking solutions deployed to deliver those products. Read More...

Ghana Social Accountability Mechanism (GSAM) Annual Report Year 4

The fourth year of implementation of the USAID-funded Ghana’s Strengthening Accountability Mechanisms (GSAM) project covered the period October 1, 2017 to September 30, 2018, during which the GSAM Consortium – CARE, OXFAM and ISODEC – continued with its activities in the 50 districts, known as the Social Accountability Districts. These activities were aimed primarily at strengthening the capacity of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and citizens to monitor and assess capital projects of their MMDAs, using scorecards, and to use the information generated to engage with the MMDAs to demand accountability and improved performance in capital project delivery. Read More...

CARE Rapid Gender Analysis in Lao PDR

Tropical Storm Son Tinh, which hit Lao PDR on 18-19 July 2018, led to a breach in the Xe Pien-Xe Nam Noy hydropower saddle dam dam on 23 July 2018, causing a flash flood through 13 villages downstream in Sanamxay district, Attapeu Province. The Government declared the affected areas a National Disaster Area. CARE undertook a two-phase rapid gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) analysis in Attapeu to provide information and recommendations about the different needs, capacities and coping strategies of women, men, boys and girls including people with a disability and ethnic minority groups. This report is the second version of this evolving analysis and provides a valuable contribution to the limited information available on communities’ lives in the temporary residence camps where they are now residing. [25 pages] Read More...

Women’s Empowerment Program (WEP) Midterm Report

In 2009, Norad-funded women empowerment programs (WEPs) started implementation in seven countries: Burundi, Mali, Myanmar, Niger, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda. In 2009 and early 2010, an extensive quantitative baseline study was conducted in these countries around a common set of indicators. The present mid-term review (MTR), which was done using qualitative methodology, analysed in depth the process and nature of changes that the programs are contributing towards. In all the program countries, the country WEP team carried out the review internally with the technical assistance of an external consultant and CARE Norway (CN).

With slight variations, the overall objectives of the country WEPs focused on the economic, social, and political empowerment of women. The village savings and loan association (VSLA) methodology was common for all the programs; and these groups create the platform for working on other aspects of the program besides economic empowerment. The initial changes that the programs produce are seen in terms of increased access to savings and loans, employment opportunities, and asset ownership. The ability of the women to earn income, generate their own savings and make financial contributions in the household (HH) has greatly improved their self-esteem, thereby giving them better leverage to involve in and influence HH decision making processes. Men were highly appreciative of the income women were able to bring in to the family as a result of being involved in VSLAs. Through their improved position in the household, women reported being able to negotiate the use of sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services and the abandonment of different harmful practices. Through the use of couples-based approach and engaging men initiatives, HH relationships are beginning to improve; men in these households are reportedly starting to have a more positive attitude towards women’s empowerment and are themselves even taking part in domestic activities in some contexts. The VSLA approach is enabling women to create strong social networks that are becoming an influential force for social change. As a result of increased knowledge on their human rights and increasing leadership skills, women are beginning to understand how they have to position themselves to realize their strategic interests. The VSLA groups and networks also enable women to mobilise support when they are running for elections; this support has increased number of women being elected into different posts. The contribution of women in VSLAs and in community leadership positions is being increasingly recognised and appreciated by local authority figures, which can be seen when they actively seek the advice of women and VSL groups in relation to different community development initiatives.
Through working in partnership with others, the programs are being implemented in a high quality and timely manner. Engagement with strategic partners has occurred effectively in some countries, and been instrumental in enabling the programs to link grassroots evidence to national level advocacy activities which have achieved concrete results. [52 pages] Read More...

Women’s Empowerment Program (WEP) 2009-2013

CARE Norway, collaborating CARE country offices (COs), and partners have from 2009 through 2013 run the “Women Empowerment Programme” (WEP). With funding from NORAD, it has been implemented in Mali, Niger, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Myanmar and DRC (from 2013).

The results presented in this report derive from CARE’s monitoring systems, thematic assessments and research done over the 5 years. This final report is intended to give NORAD an overview of key results within the program’s four thematic focus areas: 1)Women’s Economic Empowerment, 2)Women’s Participation in Decision Making, 3) Women’s Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, and 4) Prevention and Mitigation of Gender-based violence. In agreement with NORAD, the end-line evaluation of the WEP is due in May 2015. [55 pages] Read More...

Strengthening Non-State Actors for Peace (SNAP) Final Evaluation

‘Strengthening Non-State Actors for Peace in Kayah State’ (SNAP) project is a 36 months project (Jan/2016 to December/2018), implemented by CARE Myanmar in partnership with the Karenni State Women’s Network (KSWN) across Kayah State. The budget allocation for which is €575,423. Kayah State is one of the smallest by population in the Union, it is conflict-affected and lately has been the site of tension between Civil Society Organisations (CSO) and State Government representatives. Despite its size, Kayah State hosts a relatively high number of INGO and UN agency development and peace support partners working in a range of sectors. The SNAP project’s overall Goal is to enable non-state actors, with a focus on KSWN to support women’s organisations and grass roots members in representing their constituents’ interests in governmental and peace processes. The Objective of the project is to have KSWN able to ‘advocate for the needs of their constituents with decision-makers and provide community education and services through their members’. [59 pages] Read More...

Women and Youth Entrepreneurs Leading Change (OBADER)

Report on the Baseline Assessment carried out for the CARE West Bank and Gaza (now CARE in the occupied Palestinian territory) project OBADER (Women and Youth Entrepreneurs Leading Change). [102 pages] Read More...

Community-Driven Financial Inclusion for the Most Vulnerable Households

The Tat Lan Programme, funded by the Livelihoods and Food Security Trust Fund (LIFT) in Myanmar was implemented in two phases (2013-15 and 2017-18). The overall goal was to ensure a sustainable increase of food and nutrition security and incomes of participant households in 259 communities in the townships of Myebon, Pauktaw, Kyaukpyu and Minbya in Rakhine State. [24 pages] Read More...

Summative Evaluation for Food Sufficiency for Farmers

The evaluation primarily focused on assessing the overall performance of the project, ultimate and intermediate outcomes and the way in which they individually and collectively contribute to ultimate outcomes of the project in particular and overall goal of PSNP in general. In addition, this evaluation seeks to capture the project lessons learned at different levels including drawing out the rationale of why and how the project results were achieved. The evaluation covers, West Hararghe, East Hararghe, and South Gondar zones that are intervention areas of the project results from 2013-14 and 2017-18.

Supported and funded by the GAC, the five-year FSF project has been implemented by CARE Canada and CARE Ethiopia in close partnership with relevant government intuitions and private sector partners from 2013-14 and 2017-18. With a budget of CAD$13,052,440, of which CAD$ 12,000,000 was contributed by GAC and CAD$ 1,052,440 by CARE, the project was implemented in a total of 11 woredas within Oromia and Amhara Regions. In the Oromia Region, the project was active in two zones, West Hararghe (in Odabultum, Doba, Messela and Tullo woredas) and in East Hararghe (Kurfa-Chelle, Haromaya, Meta and Deder woredas). In the Amhara region, South Gondar Zone, the project was implemented in Simada, Ebinat and Tach-Gayant woredas. The overall objective of the project is to increase the beneficiary household’s income to equal CAD$ 400 over the life of the project and to ensure beneficiaries are food secure. The project’s total primary beneficiaries’ number is 42,887 PSNP households and out of these, 34,310, including 5,000 Female Headed Households (FHH), are expected to achieve sustained graduation from food aid. [222 pages] Read More...

Bringing Agroforestry to Scale for Improved Livelihoods

The BrASIL-CSVIL project is a collaborative project between the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) and CARE Mali (HARANDE Program) for maximizing synergies. The Goal of the Harande program, meaning ‘food security’ in Fulani, consists of “Sustainable food, nutrition and income security for vulnerable household members in Youwarou, Tenenkou, Bandiagara and Douentza in Mopti region. The collaboration under BrASIL-CSVIL aims at ensuring a better intervention that takes full account of adaptation to climate change, optimal natural resource management and reduction of target communities’ vulnerability to climate change. This partnership puts high emphasis on the bottom up and community led, cascading training of trainers and farmer-to-farmers learning approaches. A key strength of the Harande program is its links with other development actors that maximize synergy and multiply impacts for population groups beyond the targeted communities as well as leveraging efforts funded by USAID by establishing linkages with Feed the Future projects. In order to be more inclusive and innovative in its approach, Harande proposed to work closely with all the USAID projects operating in the Mopti region but also other development actors. Initially, the project was planned to be implemented in 10 villages in Mopti region. However, in 2018, the security issues have been degraded within the region especially in the district of Douenza. Therefore, our activities were focused within 2 villages, Dandoli (new) and Sincarma (old) in the district of Bandiagara. Some activities were done in three other new villages including Koé Doe (Commune of Pignari), Wendéguélé (Commune of Dandoli) and Ourou (Commune of Dourou), all in the Cercle of Bandiagara of Mopti region.
The present report gives an overview of activities conducted in the Fiscal Year of 2018 from October 1, 2017 to September 30, 2018 under the BrASIL-CSVIL project. [17 pages]
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