Our Strategy and How it Works

The Problem

Men and women around the world are struggling because they don’t have access to financial services, leaving them with limited income and job opportunities, creating uncertain futures for their families. According to the World Bank Poverty and Shared Prosperity Report, 2 billion people, more than half of the world’s adults, have no access to banking services.

The result is that roughly one in three of the world’s adult population lacks the financial services they could use to dramatically improve their lives.

This population is often called the underserved. These are primarily the working poor, many of whom live on one or two dollars a day and are either self-employed or operate a microbusiness. Many wage earners are also very poor, and though not self-employed or operating a microbusiness, also need such financing.”

(Source: Lieberman, Ira. n.d. The Growth and Commercial Evolution of Microfinance).

Global Strategy

An Overview

Step 1

Give A Hand identifies a project location. Kenya is our first effort.

Step 2

Local partnerships are created and more research is performed to asses project suitability.

Step 3

An implementation plan is formed in conjunction with local stakeholders and government.

Step 4

The Give A Hand 4-Step Process is implemented and monitored.

Step 5

The Give A Hand program is evaluated and reports are shared with funders and stakeholders.

A 4- Step process for Combating Poverty

Analyzing the Problem

The problem is that 1.2 billion people globally live in “Acute Multidimensional Poverty.” This includes 579 million in Sub-Saharan countries and 593 million children.

In Kenya, 37.1% are below the income poverty line, and 12.4% are in “Severe multidimensional poverty conditions.” All data according to Human Development Reports by the United Nations and the 2022 Global Multi-dimensional Poverty Index Report.

Developing a Strategy

We combat poverty by building financial stability, and we build such stability by creating access to microfinance services and training on financial literacy.

We also utilize the Innovation Design Process to create the program blueprints.

Our experience, validated by research, confirms that access to micro financial services has a significant impact on the personal and local economy.

Implementing the Strategy

In Kenya, the Give A Hand program, through the AFRESA Credit Union partnership, delivers access to microfinance services such as savings accounts and microloans which the participants can utilize in conjunction with training, to start or support their microbusiness.

Evaluating the Strategy

Our Principal Investigator evaluates the efforts for fidelity of outputs and outcomes. Some of the expected outcomes are:

• Families increase household income with their micro businesses.
• Families can now invest in basic needs such as food, health, and education.
• Families improve quality of life.

The United States Agency for International Development informs that two-thirds of Kenyans live in poverty and make less than $3.20 per day. The agency also states that approximately 70% of Kenyan families are chronically vulnerable because of poor nutrition, food insecurity, and preventable diseases.

The Give A Hand Micro-Lending pilot started in Kenya in 2018, a region with a market population of more than 50 million. Through Give A Hand, small (Micro) loans are issued every month. The loans support the micro businesses of our participants.

Microfinance is linked to programs that benefit clients with severe subsistence problems in developing countries. Microfinance overlapped with microcredit (small loans) aims at improving the lives of families by sustaining small-scale economic activities (Addisalem, 2015).

Research Based Strategy

Digital financial services, such as microloans, have been estimated to boost the annual GDP of emerging economies by USD 3.7 trillion by 2025 (International Finance Cooperation, MasterCard Foundation, 2018).

Microfinance provides strength to boost the economic activities of low-income group people and thus contributes to the eradication of their poverty (Almas & Mukhtar, 2014).

In Kenya, women-headed households with access to mobile money services increased their savings by more than a fifth. (CGAP.org) Researchers also show the importance of microfinance on women’s income increment, savings improvement, and effective decision-making. (Mengstie, B.2022)

The Give A Hand Microfinance Program

The goal of the program is to engage the individual with financial services, deliver financial literacy knowledge, and provide ongoing support. The combination of these interventions results in the participant having access to financial services to support their microbusiness, become well-informed about managing their own microbusiness, increase their business profitability, and therefore increase quality of life. The Give A Hand program through the AFRESA partnership delivers access to microloans which the participants can utilize in conjunction with other financial services, and training, to start or support their microbusiness. This program embodies the framework of Give A Hand of giving individuals an opportunity and letting them create the outcomes.

Microfinance has been utilized as an intervention to combat poverty for decades. It involves microloans and several other interventions. Research has been thoroughly conducted to understand and highlight the impact of microcredit, microfinance, and microloans.

World Vision defines a microloan in the following manner:

“Microloans involve lending small sums of money, often just a few dollars, to people who do not have a measurable credit history, assets to secure the loans, or access to mainstream financial providers. Credit can be used to purchase livestock, seeds for crops, fertilizer and irrigation kits, or to rent storage facilities allowing farmers to sell their produce when prices are higher. For other businesses, credit is available for start-up capital, to buy equipment or stock.”

The Give A Hand Micro-Lending pilot started in Kenya in 2018, a region with a market population of more than 50 million. Micro-lending is part of the Microfinance global industry and market. Through Give A Hand, thousands of small (Micro) loans ranging from $5 to $50 are issued every month.

Microfinance is linked to programs that benefit clients with severe subsistence problems in developing countries. For many years, microfinance overlapped with microcredit (small loans), aimed at improving the lives of clients and their families or at sustaining small-scale economic activities (Addisalem, 2015).

The widespread adoption of mobile phones together with advances in computing power has given rise to ‘digital credit’, a fintech innovation greatly impacting microfinance. Digital credit’ refers to loans that are requested, received and repaid, all through mobile phones via interaction with a computer system (Francisy et al., 2017).

Intervention programs that tackle basic needs and support the Financial Stability Initiative

We also assess the regional conditions in respect to food shortages, lack of access to clean water, and lack of access to education. We believe that these conditions need to be met as part of a wholistic approach to combat poverty and to ensure our access to financial services and financial literacy is successful. We know that in Kenya these conditions present a challenge to individuals pulling themselves out of poverty.

Give A Hand partners with nonprofit organizations, and local stakeholders to create projects that address these basic needs (Food, Water, Education). Each project is unique and responds to the local need and cultural context. You can choose to donate to a specific project and create the impact needed to lift communities out of poverty.

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Our Strategy and How It Works