End Poverty: Enterprise Development International

The following material is a summary of information on the Enterprise Development International website. I urge you to go there and see the pictures, read the stories of the great work being done. You will be humbled by the impact of microloans on families living in poverty, and I hope you will also be moved to help continue this wonderful mission.

I’ve supported Enterprise Development International with gifts of money and time as a Board of Associates member, and in my prayers. I’ve talked to people who administer the programs, and met and heard the life-changing stories of those who have been helped by the dedication of the Enterprise Development partners. Trips to these countries are offered each year to see the programs and their impact on families and neighborhoods. Microloans through indigeneous partners are the best way to make sure funds are delivered directly to the people who can best use them, and not have them taken by corrupt government officials so the aid never reaches the most needy.

The founding of Enterprise Development in 1985 embodied one missionary's dream: a nonprofit, Christian organization that would enable poor entrepreneurs to start sustainable family businesses and pull themselves and their dependents out of poverty. In the past 20 years, Enterprise Development has enabled more than a hundred thousand hard-working entrepreneurs in some 50 countries to free themselves and their families from grinding poverty. By providing small loans, basic business training, encouragement and access to other financial services, people living in poverty are helped to start or expand their own businesses or microenterprises. They are then able to support their families, emerge from the cycle of poverty and contribute in many positive ways to the long-term development of their communities.

Enterprise Development works with a network of faith-based, locally registered microenterprise development organizations around the world, working as partners to transfer required skills and capital. These local programs understand the culture and have a heart for the communities where they work to give the poor the opportunity to free themselves from poverty through profitable business ownership. This mission is accomplished by:

• offering business training to low-income persons who have the potential and the desire to become self-supporting;
  
• providing small loans to poor entrepreneurs who have viable business ideas but need capital; and
  
• mentoring participants through ongoing personal and professional encouragement
  

Depending on the country, first time loans range in size from $50 to $2,000. Regardless of the size of the loan, the results are significant. With profits from their businesses, parents are able to send their children to school, to provide better nutrition, health care, shelter and clothing, to become engaged in their communities and to break the cycle of poverty. Lives are changed now and for generations to come.

Each year, these programs rely on the expertise and financial resources of Enterprise Development to offer real hope to thousands and thousands of families. Today, the work of Enterprise Development is changing lives on five continents, targeting those who otherwise have no access to conventional credit. One loan at a time, these impoverished, disadvantaged clients - the vast majority of whom are women - launch small, family businesses that provide for their families and create jobs in their neighborhoods.

In 2004, families in the following countries received over 85,000 microloans totaling over $14 million: Bangladesh, Egypt, Guatemala, India, Mexico, Nicaragua, Philippines, Romania, and Uganda.

Loan repayment rates in Enterprise-funded programs typically exceed 95 percent, surpassing the performance of many commercial institutions. Rather than cultivating dependency, this strategy of microenterprise creates self-supporting entrepreneurs and, as a consequence, healthier families and stronger local churches. (Enterprise programs do not discriminate on the basis of religious affiliation or impose any religious requirements on prospective or current clients.)