This project will create sustainable incomes for extremely poor participants who are often disabled, widowed or elderly, through the establishment of a Goat Bank.
The idea is of the "bank" is not lending money but lending goats. A person
receives a female goat and when offspring are born returns a female
goat back to the bank, and is then free to sell the other offspring.
This project cost will cover:
- Equipment and supplies including purchase of goats, fencing of the goat raising area, start-up fund for goat enterprise,
- Monitoring and evaluation of goat banks
- Field operational costs, travel and transportation
Objective, aim and outcomes
Aim: To reduce poverty through developing agriculture and the rural economy.
Objective: To establish goat banks for extremely poor and disadvantaged persons
Outcomes: To create sustainable income for those villagers that cannot work in the fields through the sale of goats offspring. This income will see that the target beneficiaries being able to contribute to the family income rather than burdening the family.
Background - why is this project needed?
Lao PDR is one of the poorest countries in SE Asia and Sayabouli is one of the country’s poorest districts. Resident villagers in remote areas of the Sayabouli district are primarily of Prai ethnicity and experience very high levels of poverty due to the fact that they have very few or no assets and their day-to-day survival depends almost exclusively on labour intensive agricultural activities.
The poorest households, mostly comprising widows, elderly
and disabled people have very low labour capacity and therefore have
greatest difficulty surviving and coping with extreme poverty.
As no welfare system exists, there is no way to buffer shocks such as
illness, disability or death of one spouse within poor communities. The existing exception is
“extended familial solidarity” but it often remains very limited given
the high level of poverty in the area.
As a result, households with a
low workforce capacity (resulting from a shock or societal disadvantage
e.g. elderly, widowed or disabled) have the greatest difficulties
coping day-to-day or to disengage from
this “poverty/ lack of labour force” spiral.
Partners/community involvement
The project partners with the district level government department of
Agriculture to provide the technical input and training to the
participating villages. The village management committee (an existing
structure) will also be a primary partner of the project and will be
responsible for management of the goat raiser.
Consistent with local norms and systems the goat herding will be subcontracted to a village goat raiser.
Project fit into larger strategy or project
This project is a smaller component of a large project which is funded
by the Swiss Development Committee (SDC). This larger project has been
implementing activities over the last 6 years with key activities
focusing on increasing food security of poor and middle income
households, and increasing Prai women’s and men’s ability to
participate meaningfully in household and community development
processes.
As far as livestock activities are concerned, the project aims to
improve the capacity of villagers in terms of animal management
(vaccination, treatment) and develop a commercial network of local
animal service providers. In parallel, the project aims to increase the
access to livestock assets especially for the poorest households.
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