Women's Economic Empowerment

64 page impact assessment of Krishi Utsho Micro-franchise project, an emerging social enterprise project. It runs on a micro- franchise model by CARE Bangladesh. KU started in the year 2012, as a part of Strengthening the Dairy Value Chain (SDVC) project to provide timely access to affordable and quality agro inputs and advisory services to rural smallholder dairy farmers, particularly women. Later on with the support from the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands (EKN), the project selected shops in villages to ensure last mile access and branded 198 shops so far under KU brand. Those branded shops or franchisee are acting as a one stop solution center for more than 45,000 smallholder farmers combined, particularly for vulnerable women in North-East and South-West regions in Bangladesh, and thereby contributing to increased productivity and ensuring resilience in livelihood. KU will be expanding the product line in the franchisee shops according to farmers’ need. The purpose of this impact assessment was to identify the project impact on the beneficiary groups so far, to capture deviation (intended and unintended) from what it originally set out to do. The assessment thus intends to look at the model’s sustainability even after the project ceases to exist and make recommendations along this line. The information from this assessment will be used internally to make necessary adjustments, so that the project will achieve its intended objective and outcomes. Read More...