Working with the ultra‐poor: learning from BRAC experiences
Working with the ultra‐poor: learning from BRAC experiences
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与极端贫困人口合作：学习 BRAC 经验
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发表时间：
2004
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
P. Mosley
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
S. Halder;P. Mosley
本文介绍了 BRAC 在过去二十年中与极端贫困人口合作的经验。极端贫困人口是人口中最贫困的群体，资产基础很少或根本没有，极易受到任何冲击的影响，并且主要依靠雇佣劳动力。他们特别是农村地区贫困的主要原因是贫困遗传、收入来源减少和健康状况不佳。小额信贷虽然针对的是贫困人口，但由于生活资源匮乏，极端贫困人口因担心负担过重而不愿借贷，对现金经济也确实存在恐惧。他们需要大力推动，以尽可能无风险的方式将其初始捐赠基础提高到一定水平，这是获得更多其他资源及其生产利用所必需的。 BRAC 弱势群体发展创收计划 (IGVGD) 于 1986 年制定，源于以下三种情况：(i) 认识到“把一切交给社区”并不能解决社区内极端贫困人口的边缘化问题； (ii) 联合国世界粮食计划署当年提出的粮食援助提议，为克服极端贫困者“对现金的恐惧”提供了可能；(iii) BRAC 决定将粮食援助、储蓄和低资本要求活动培训相结合，作为帮助边缘化群体摆脱极端贫困的一种手段。 IVGGD 是一个集食品分配、储蓄、小额信贷提供、社会意识建设和技能发展培训以及基本医疗保健干预措施于一体的综合方案。国内外的不同研究结果表明，IGVGD在惠及极端贫困人口方面非常成功，而且具有成本效益；来自男户主家庭的女性可以更充分地参与 IVGGD 计划活动；使用非政府组织信贷的是男性，丈夫的收入是分期付款的主要来源。然而，一些女性倾向于只利用 IGVGD（主要是粮食援助）的消费相关福利，而不是逐步进入自给自足的企业。为此，2002 年制定了一项新计划“挑战贫困边界”(CFPR)，目前仍处于试点阶段。它比IGVGD有更严格的目标要求，对极端贫困人口提供更深入的指导，并在妇幼健康领域提供更深入的补贴，但采用了同样的监督方式，从低风险活动“分级”到高风险活动。 IVGGD 作为一种模式现在已被广泛模仿和采用，至少在孟加拉国境内如此，根据最新统计，约有 72 个组织为极端贫困人口提供了一些规定。在最后一节中，我们回顾了评估这些不同活动对 IA 方法的影响。一个有趣的发现是，在小额信贷通常运作的中低端金融市场，定量方法产生的结果（对于女性借款人的福利）比定性方法更乐观，但对于极端贫困者来说，情况恰恰相反；至少，许多 IVGGD 借款人的收入变化不大，但自主权和社会地位却有显着改善。版权所有 © 2004 约翰·威利父子有限公司
This paper describes BRAC experiences of working with the ultra-poor over the last two decades. The ultra-poor is the poorest section among the population with a few or no asset base, highly vulnerable to any shocks and mainly depending on wage labour. The main causes of their poverty, especially in the rural areas, are poverty inheritance, loss of income earner and ill health. Although microfinance is targeted to the poor, the ultra-poor, lacking livelihood resources, are reluctant to borrow with the fear of being overburdened, and indeed have a fear of the cash economy. They need a critical push to uplift their initial endowment base, in as risk-free a manner as possible, to a certain level which is necessary for getting greater access to other resources and their productive utilization. The BRAC Income Generation for Vulnerable Group Development (IGVGD) scheme was devised in 1986, and arose from the coming together of three circumstances: (i) an awareness that 'leaving everything to the community' would not deal with the problem of marginalisation of the ultra-poor within the community; (ii) an offer in that year of food aid from the UN World Food Programme, which offered the potential of over coming the ultra-poor's 'fear of cash' and (iii) a decision by BRAC to use a combination of food aid, savings and training in activities with low capital requirements as a means of enabling the marginalized to climb the ladder out of ultra-poverty. IGVGD is an integrated package of food distribution, savings, micro-credit provision, social awareness-building and skill development training and essential health care interventions. Different study findings conducted within the country and outside indicate that IGVGD is very successful and also cost-effective in reaching the ultra-poor; and that females coming from male-headed households can participate more fully in the IGVGD programme activities; it is the men who use NGO credit, and husbands' incomes are the primary source of installment payments. However, there has been a tendency for some women to take advantage only of the consumption-related benefits of the IGVGD (principally food aid) and not to graduate up all the steps of the ladder into self-sustained businesses. In response to this, a new programme, Challenging the frontiers of poverty (CFPR) was devised in 2002, and is still in its pilot stages. This has more stringent targeting requirements than IGVGD and provides for more intensive mentoring of the ultra-poor, and provides more intensive subsidy in the area of maternal and child health, but adopts the same approach of supervised 'graduation' from minimal-risk to higher-risk activities. IGVGD as a model now been quite widely imitated and adapted, at least within Bangladesh, and at the latest count some 72 organizations had some provision for the ultra-poor. In a final section we review the implications of evaluation of these diverse activities for IA methodology. One interesting finding is that whereas, in the lower-middle reaches of financial markets at which microfinance typically operates, quantitative approaches yield more optimistic findings (for women borrowers' welfare) than qualitative, for the ultra-poor it is the other way around; many IGVGD borrowers, at least, experienced few changes in income, but important improvements in autonomy and social status. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.