Microenterprise Development
The United States Agency for International Development has been working over the past three decades to expand opportunities for hundreds of millions of people who rely on microenterprises in the informal sector for their livelihoods. USAID has invested in hundreds of private microenterprise development organizations around the world-organizations that are reshaping financial and business service markets to better serve poorer clients. Extending improved and expanded services to many more poor people can enable them to gain access to a variety of sources of capital, information, inputs, technologies and markets. By linking to these resources, poor entrepreneurs will be better able to seize opportunities they have not had in the past, and to create better lives for themselves and their families.
USAID's microenterprise development strategy seeks to address two pressing challenges: -
To link microenterprises to greater opportunities for growth, which includes integrating them on more favorable terms into the formal economies of their countries and connecting them to expanded information and resource networks.
- To bring the benefits of microfinance and business development services to poorer people ("reaching down"), ensuring that the positive impacts of microenterprise development programs reach those in the most need.
USAID works in partnership with private voluntary organizations (PVOs), local nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and other organizations to extend much-needed services to an expanding circle of underserved clients-especially women, the rural poor and smallholder farm families. The track record of USAID and other donors proves that, despite the challenges of extending services to poor people, microenterprise development can be carried out effectively and sustainably, even while focusing on reaching poorer and more vulnerable clients.
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