World Job and Food Bank -- Bolivia

Micro-credit and Civil Society Building
Chuquisaca, Potosi & Oruro, Bolivia

In early 2002, the WJFB signed an agreement with CIDA and forged a partnership with Gems and Hope (a Canadian NGO) to implement the project “Micro-Credit and Civil Society Building” in Cjuquisaca, Potosi & Oruro, Bolivia.

This project seeks to improve the living conditions of Bolivia’s poorest women and their families through the incorporation of civil society strengthening and community advocacy within village banking projects. The purpose of this project is to:

Strengthen the organization and management capacity of women leaders and participants in village banks to develop self-sustaining activities, generate income and work together to develop their community;
Create the local capacity to identify and prioritize community needs, and to propose evaluate, and participate in constructive problem solving, maximizing both local community and government resources;
Create the local capacity to define roles and responsibilities of both community and government in the implementation of problem solving, and to enable communities to formalize permanent relationships with local government in order to advocate for, and address community needs.

The project will target rural women in the departments of Chuquiaca, Potosi and Oruro. In these deprived rural areas, families with a female head of household are particularly vulnerable: 94% of the rural population is considered to be poor, of which 26% are considered moderately poor and 68% live in condition of extreme poverty. The quality of life is defined by poverty, a severe lack of basic services including access to potable water and sanitation, health services, education, adequate housing and basic infrastructure. Work is centered on survival, and the ability to allocate work activities become greatly reduced. When combined with a lack of access to credit, few opportunities exist to save money or to use it to invest in seed capital for activities that would generate greater income.

We believe that breaking this cycle of poverty for rural Bolivian women and their families suggests focusing on interventions in two vital areas simultaneously – credit access and civil society strengthening. The project is focused on providing women with skills and support to identify community needs and propose solutions, which combine community with government assistance. Training is provided to the community banking members with respect to skills in self-sustaining activities, generating income and working together to develop their community. Women are encouraged to expand their perception of self-worth and self-capacity. The project provides training and education to 60 community banks with direct beneficiaries totaling 1,200 women and indirect beneficiaries totaling 5,000 people.

Catholic Relief Services (CRS) in Bolivia is our local project partner, who has had extensive experience in micro-credit projects for over 9 years. CRS will also work with two local organizations to deliver this project.

This three-year project started in January 2001. The total budget of the project is $388,535.00 with contributions from CIDA, Gems and Hope, the WJFB and the host country partner.