---

A Cost-Effective and Sustainable Approach to Poverty Alleviation Village Enterprise works to end extreme poverty in rural Africa through entrepreneurship and innovation. Our program is simple and cost-effective. Validated by an independent randomized controlled trial, the Village Enterprise Graduation program provides groups of three entrepreneurs with cash transfers as seed capital, training and ongoing mentoring by a local business mentor. We organize the business groups into Business Savings Groups (BSGs) of 30 entrepreneurs (10 business groups) to allow access to growth capital, provide a safe place for savings, and build social capital. Examples of businesses include livestock, farming, small retail stores and restaurants, tailoring, and beekeeping. Village Enterprise has started over 48,000 businesses and trained over 185,000 East Africans. As we scale up and move into new communities and countries, we’re designing and testing pilots to improve our impact and efficienc

---