High poverty rates in Côte d’Ivoire contribute to persistent social challenges, including gender inequality and child labour, despite ongoing efforts from both public and private sectors. Limited access to formal financial services further fuels this, restricting households from securing loans or making necessary investments.

Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs) have emerged as a promising tool to improve financial access, contributing to household income and child well-being. Their success lies in their simplicity and accessibility, allowing members to save and borrow without complex procedures. However, their informal nature limits their impact; while VSLA loans may cover small farm expenses or school fees, they are often insufficient for larger investments, limiting entrepreneurial opportunities. Integrating VSLAs into the formal financial sector can significantly enhance their economic and social benefits, providing members with access to larger loans and reducing risk for Microfinance Institutions.

EmpowHER, a two-year program developed by the Beyond Beans Foundation, aims to address these challenges by strengthening and formalizing VSLAs in cocoa, coffee and cashew-growing regions of Côte d’Ivoire. Through tailored training and support, the programme aims to equip VSLAs to meet the criteria for financial institution approval, enabling farming households to access essential savings and loan services that could drive income growth and economic resilience.

Tailoring financial training for an increase in financial inclusion

The EmpowHER project is a collaboration between ETG, Beyond Beans Foundation, Advans, and KIT, working together to expand financial services for Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs) and promote financial inclusion. The project is structured in two phases. The first phase focusses on assessment and preparation, identifying the eligible VLSAs and designing tailored support. The second phase centres on implementation, training the selected VSLAs appropriately and linking them to micro-financial institutes.

In the first phase of the project, KIT developed a monitoring and evaluation framework, including a Theory of Change with assumptions, and conducted a baseline study through the collection of primary data on household characteristics, farm economics, non-farm income, women’s empowerment, SRHR practices, financial inclusion, and child well-being and school enrollment. The results of this study form the base for EmpowHER’s second phase, that aims to tailor (financial) trainings appropriately to the needs of EmpowHER participants. Eventually, the activities are believed to have a positive impact on household income, school enrolment, and child well-being.

While EmpowHER has a focus on increasing school enrolment, the programme simultaneously puts a focus to reducing drop-out rates. For girls, teen pregnancies have long been the largest contributor to this. As such, an SRHR component is introduced at community level, providing education on SRHR aspects to parents, teachers, and children.

The role of KIT Institute

As knowledge partner, KIT Institute is supporting the project through the following activities:

1. Designing the questionnaire to gather baseline and endline data among cocoa, cashew, and coffee producing households in Côte d’Ivoire;
2. Running data analysis to answer critical questions and test assumptions;
3. Produce detailed reports in findings;
4. Create recommendations that will guide decisions on the implementation of the programme.

Answering critical questions

The research KIT Institute conducts in this programme aims to answer the following research question:

• To what extent does increased formal financial inclusion, through VSLAs, reduce the Living Income gap and mitigate child labour risks in cocoa, coffee, and cashew-growing communities in Côte d’Ivoire?

To answer this, the following sub-questions are guiding:

• How do changes in the type of income generating activities, the time spent on them, and income levels affect child well-being?
• How does access to more significant credit and advantageous interest rates from formal financial institutions shape financial behaviour (taking out loan, savings) of households?
• When taking out loans via formal financial institutions, in what (human capital, IGAs, consumables, etc.) do households invest?
• To what extend are existing income generating activities bolstered? Will household start investing in new ones and if so, will it be vertical integration (e.g. from food crop cultivation to food processing)? And which motivations drive their decision-making?
• How does increased access to more significant credit, and advantageous interest rates from formal financial institutions, enable households to increase their income?
• How does activity support such as financial coaching, entrepreneurial coaching, gender sensitization, and other activities in the project, play a role in supporting the financial empowerment of the household and the well-being of their children?