Generational poverty occurs when people do not have the resources, such as financial capital, education or social capital necessary to rise out of poverty, and it has occurred over two or more generations.
Our Family Empowerment Program (FEP) was launched in 2019. Since then, our AJ donors have been generously sponsoring the families in our program. We are thankful to all our donors for this direct investment they are making in the health, nutrition, education, and social support needs of our 50 FEP families!
As we have shared in the first part of this blog post, it is now time for FEP mothers to start Income Generating Activities (IGA). Thirty-seven of the 50 mothers in our program are single parents. This means, 74 percent of the mothers are the sole providers to their households. It is therefore important to empower these mothers economically in activities that will bring them consistent income.
IGA is an important component of FEP that will sustain the future of each family. It is all about improving the participation of FEP mothers in economic activity and helping them making a stable income to support their family.
Based on each mother’s skillset, we are currently walking them through the IGA plan and providing them training on how to actually implement it.
Some of the areas of IGA our FEP mothers are interested in pursuing include dry food preparation, petty trade of vegetables and fruits, and street coffee and tea shops. AJ believes the engagement of mothers in income activities that are aligned to their interest and skill sets is key to their success!
Today, we would like to share some of the IGA plans of some of our FEP mothers that are currently underway.
Elshaday Gebru
Single Parent
Children: Two
IGA Plan: Coffee and Tea Shop
Status: Ready to Implement Plan
Adugna Negasi
Married
Children: Three
IGA Plan: Preparing and selling fast food
Status: Planning underway
Mignot Bisrat
Married
Children: Two
IGA Plan: Milk Production
Status: Planning Underway
Kalkidan Dereje
Single Parent
Children: One
IGA Plan: Coffee Shop
Status: Planning Underway
Haimanot Iskinder
Married
Children: Two
IGA Plan: Food processing and sewing cloth
Status: Planning uderway
Konjit Moges
Married
Children: One
IGA Plan: Making Enjera
Status: Planning underway
Our FEP mothers need support in seed-money to help make these business plans a reality!
Our goal is to raise $15,000 USD for the 50 mothers between now and the end of 2021.
Nothing will make us happier than to see our FEP mothers become self-sufficient and graduate from our program in a sustainable manner! We are also confident that our AJ community will come alongside us to support these mothers succeed in their IGA endeavors!