Promoting Rural Integration and Security through Microfinance in Africa (PRISMA), Kenya

PRISMA seeks to improve the lives of very poor women and orphaned or vulnerable children in rural East Africa by easing access to financial services for women in East Africa, especially the carers of orphans and vulnerable children. Women are a primary focus because they tend to invest additional income in improving the lives of their children.

Project Goals:

  • Increase the number of World Vision’s female loan clients in five East African countries from 50,000 to 210,000.
  • Improve the level of net assets among 75 percent of loan clients
  • Through lending, create 277,000 jobs for women and sustain 1.3 million jobs for women
  • Improve care and support for 150,000 orphans and vulnerable children, and impact 1.8 million children overall
  • Offer savings accounts for 150,000 orphans and vulnerable children that can
    be used for education or to start up a business

Project Interventions through Microfinance:
The PRISMA project will implement activities with the five microfinance institutions (MFIs) in the project countries that result in the following nine outputs, or tangible services:

  1. Increased capacity to learn and support integrated HIV/AIDS and microfinance services.
  2. Improved access to appropriate financial services for rural female clients, including those caring for orphans and vulnerable children.
  3. Improved responsiveness of credit and savings products to the needs of rural female clients.
  4. Increased capacity of MFIs to partner with World Vision and other HIV/AIDS agencies.
  5. Increased capacity of the MFI boards in governance.
  6. Increased capacity of senior leadership to transform MFIs into large-scale deliverers of financial services in rural areas.
  7. Increased capacity of MFI managers in rural finance, management, business planning, and staff development.
  8. Increased efficiency of MFI financial services and systems.
  9. Transformation into a regulated financial institution.

Project Outputs:
PRISMA project outputs will contribute over the next four years to the following two outcomes, or benefits:

  1. Sustainable, client-centered, development-integrated microfinance institutions
  2. Improved household incomes and/or resilience of economically active women, including those caring for orphans and vulnerable children.

Additional Countries:

The project is also active in Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda

Contact Information:

Grace Tiberondwa Sebageni
PRISMA Project Manager
World Vision International
Kampala, Uganda
grace_sebageni@wvi.org

Performance Period:

February 2006 to December 2009