Blog

Using a decentralized water treatment and distribution system, Jim Chu, the founder and CEO of dloHaiti, is bringing safe, affordable water to thousands on the island. Chu recently participated in diaspora engagement roadshows hosted by USAID INVEST, which encouraged members of the Haitian diaspora to invest in the country’s private sector. Jim Chu loves flying. The Silicon Valley entrepreneur and investor began paragliding in 1993. Over the last two decades, he’s participated in the sport all around the world.

The AVANSE Program—the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Feed the Future program in Northern Haiti (2013–2019)—shows the value of integrating political economy analysis (PEA) in agricultural programming.

Driving interoperable payments in Latin America through the mobile platform BICOO to address key barriers facing the unbanked.

The USAID-funded Climate Economic Analysis for Development, Investment, and Resilience Activity promotes clean energy lending by commercial banks in Central America. Seven banks in the region now have energy efficiency and green credit lines for small- and medium-sized businesses.

This post introduces USAID’s Creating Economic Opportunities project, which aims to help qualified people find jobs that give them the stability and prosperity they want for their families.

The world market for avocados is pretty much divided between Hass and green skin avocados.

USAID's Economic Competitiveness Project is helping to provide technical assistance to micro and small companies in innovation, technology adoption, manufacturing practices, marketing, and more.

USAID/Honduras recently awarded a five-year (2018-2023) activity – Transforming Market Systems (TMS) to foster competitive, resilient, and inclusive market systems that provide increased economic opportunities that incorporate poor, marginalized Hondurans and reduce incentives to migrate.

In Guatemala, USAID’s Creating Economic Opportunities project is working with the private sector and national and local authorities to strengthen economic growth and generate income and employment.

Congratulations to the three winners from the Collaborating, Learning, and Adapting (CLA) competition! These case studies demonstrate the use of CLA in the economic growth sector.

The specialty coffee trend highlights not only the U.S. consumers’ increased preference for higher quality coffee but also an interest in coffee farmers, as achieving higher quality starts with the producer. More than ever, consumers want to know their coffee’s bean-to-cup story.

Under the landmark peace agreement, the Government of Colombia has committed to addressing land issues by formalizing property rights across the country, organizing the national registry, and recovering lands that belong to the state.

With support from the Cooperative Development Program (CDP), Equal Exchange set out to answer if small farmers are really too poor to invest. In 2010, the CDP and Equal Exchange began working together with six farmer organizations in Latin America building member investment and savings programs.

With the growing need to “do more with less” and demonstrate results when using development dollars, pay-for-results is a compelling solution — one which USAID and other donors will inevitably want to see more of.

In this series, learn how cooperatives can help support local institutions, businesses, communities, and leaders to drive their own success.

Read how a project in the Haitian apparel sector is taking on the challenge of demonstrating development projects' indirect, broader systemic impacts.

This post by WLSME Peru's Ximena Querol discusses two different capacity-building interventions and their respective impacts on retention rates.

Jessie presents Freedom from Hunger's AIM Youth initiative, which tested different models of integrated financial services to help young people successfully transition into financially literate adults.

This post highlights the November 20 webinar, hosted by Microlinks, titled “Youth Savings Services: Are They Worth It?”

At the SEEP 2014 conference, a panel on the ‘Big Data’ Revolution discussed ways to use new sources of information to adapt service delivery and improve approaches to inclusive market development.

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. —T.S. Eliot

Assessing the Impact of Microfinance Services (AIMS) addressed both sides of the client assessment coin: how to improve impact and how to use client data to improve operations.

Through PISCES, the Program for Investment in the Small Capital Enterprise Sector, operational from 1979 to 1985, USAID and its partner organizations began to discover the principles of success for lending to the poor, opening the way for the microfinance industry.

Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE) and Sector3 Social Venture Group have partnered in Peru to implement the Women Entrepreneurs Leading Development project (WELD).

New index from the Economist Intelligence Unit, commissioned by the Multilateral Investment Fund, scores 20 countries on their support for female owners of micro, small and medium enterprises.