Community Group in Burundi Awarded Funds to Support Income Generation Activities :

WASHINGTON - June 23, 2009

WASHINGTON, D.C. – June 23, 2009 – The United States African Development Foundation (USADF) recently awarded a grant to a grassroots group in Burundi to support income generating activities for women.  The grant is rewarded to Œuvre Humanitaire pour la Protection et le Développment de l’Enfant en Difficulté (OPDE).  

After the grant was signed, USADF Vice Chairman Jack Leslie stated “USADF works to identify the ‘bottom billion’ – that is, the most impoverished, under-served, and under-privileged communities in Africa.  This grant is designed to support the work of one such group by creating jobs and lifting people out of poverty.”

OPDE assists children in vulnerable circumstances by working to create income generation activities and by working to defend their rights. With a severe lack of economic opportunities for widows with children in Bujumbura, the capital city is facing severe social problems: low education levels, expanding health issues, and unrelenting poverty.  This grant is designed to fund three OPDE projects which will benefit 74 widows and their 126 children in the city zones of Kinama, Citiboke, and Kamenge.  Currently, OPDE has limited operational capabilities to deliver services due to the lack of qualified staff and technical and financial resources. This project will bolster OPDE by strengthening its financial and management structures and staff.

The three year, $100,000 grant is designed to work with previously trained women in three income generation areas.  A dressmaking shop will employ 29 women in the Kinama zone where residents do not have access to such services.  Numerous schools in the area that require uniforms can depend on the shop to meet their demands.  Twenty-two women will partake in running a restaurant in Kinama market, an area of high pedestrian traffic and potential customers.  In Mubone, 23 women will partake in a rice growing project which will be of service to other widows in the community.

The funds will specifically purchase key equipment for the start up activities, provide initial inputs, develop a strategic plan, and provide funds for rental of the project sites.  Money will also help ensure that children of the participants attend school.

USADF re-established programming in Burundi in 2008.  Burundi’s current portfolio stands at nine investment projects totaling nearly $1.3 million dollars.  For more information about the portfolio, please visit the country’s quick source page at http://www.adf.gov/USADFQuickSourceCountryPortfolioPage-Burundi.htm. The United States African Development Foundation (USADF) is a United States Government agency dedicated to expanding access to economic opportunity in Africa.  Currently USADF operates in 20 African nations.  Over the past 25 years, USADF has funded nearly 1,500 projects representing in excess of $150 million in support of African enterprises and local African communities.  For more information on USADF, its programs and application guidelines, visit www.usadf.gov.

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