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Portfolio

Honduras

ADEPES

Initiative: Rural-Centered Finance with Education
Associacion de Desarollo Pespirense (ADEPES) is an NGO that works in Southern Honduras to provide sustainable community development and access to credit. Founded in 1999, ADEPES was formed by community leaders to continue the work of Save the Children and respond to the devastation caused by Hurricane Mitch in 1998. In addition to providing small working capital loans to micro-entrepreneurs, ADEPES creates alliances with local governments and forms community groups, called Cajas Rurales, to provide business and technical education, deliver agronomic training, promote food security, and strengthen resilience to economic and environmental risks.

IDH

Initiatives: Women-Centered Finance with Education, Women-Centered Finance with Health

The Human Development Institute (IDH) is a Honduran microfinance institution that provides working capital loans to predominantly rural borrowers using a group lending methodology. The organization was founded in 1979 by a Christian group looking to provide business training opportunities for microentrepreneurs in some of the poorest regions of the country.

IDH stands out from its peers because of its focus on predominantly women living in rural poverty and its use of the microfinance platform to deliver education and health services. Education sessions are delivered during monthly credit meetings and are taught by cross trained loan officers. The low-cost model also serves as an effective channel to promote annual health campaigns that are offered via partnerships with local and international organizations.

In addition to face-to-face training IDH has introduced radio spots and videos to motivate and reinforce educational messages. Videos are shown during group meetings and radio spots provide tips about budgeting, marketing, credit and savings. In a dynamic market with constantly evolving needs, these innovations demonstrate IDH’s commitment to delivering relevant and impactful educational services.

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VisionFund Honduras

Initiative: Women-Centered Finance with Education
VisionFund Honduras (VFH) is a World Vision-affiliated nonprofit organization that serves poor, rural segments of the Honduran microfinance market. Like other World Vision (WV) affiliates, VFH broadly supports the work of World Vision Honduras, which offers a wide range of social and economic development services through its Area Development Programs (ADPs). Like other WV affiliates, VFH sees its role as the financial service provider, thus focusing on their core competencies of lending and the provision of basic financial literacy. They offer group and individual loans targeted at rural production and commerce (including baking, selling homemade goods, sewing, etc.). VFH stands out from other WV affiliates because of their relatively new focus on providing group loans to community savings groups (some of which are formed and trained by WV).