Issue
Economic reforms in China have lifted an estimated 200 million people above the poverty line, but millions more remain below the World Bank-defined level of poverty of one dollar per day. Micro-credit is a strategy for reducing poverty by providing more income to participants and reducing seasonal fluctuations in household income, but it also offers opportunities to increase: access to basic health care and education, and improve the status of women and girls, Micro-credit projects in China have been successful in improving each of these areas. In its most basic form, micro-credit is the practice of making very small (micro) loans to poor people so that they can launch small businesses. It addresses the difficulty the poor have in obtaining access to credit to start a business. Proven effective in aiding the poor, micro-credit has become a staple of poverty reduction efforts in many countries. It seems to work especially well when borrowers are women, since women generally repay their loans. By itself, however, micro-credit is often not enough to lift the poorest people from poverty. But when supplemented by training in health and education, healthier household practices result which in turn, improves the well-being of children. Although UNICEF rarely supports micro-credit projects, experience in China has shown that combining credit with social development activities, referred to as “micro-credit plus,” can significantly advance children’s and women’s rights. Over the past nine years, UNICEF China has provided funding and technical assistance to several micro-credit plus programmes. The first, the “Social Development Programme for Poor Areas” (SPPA), began in 1996 and was funded until 2003. It continues to function but is now wholly supported by 25 local governments spread across 13 provinces in central and western China. The second micro-credit program, named “Local Planning and Action for Children” (LPAC), was initiated in 2001 and will continue through the end of 2005. Both programmes are implemented in close partnership with the Ministry of Commerce as well as provincial and local governments. Through these programmes, UNICEF provides poor rural women with small loans, trains them in income-generation skills, and delivers health information and life skills to help them better care for their children. Training and life skills activities provided through these programmes include the following elements: - “Facts for Life”. Focuses on child care practices and information including breastfeeding, child injury prevention, and treatment of children's diarrhea, emergency preparedness, iodine deficiency, and HIV/AIDS. - Hygiene education. Emphasizes personal and household hygiene practices and includes the adoption and use of sanitary latrines and soap. - Production skills training. To be relevant to income generation in rural areas, training typically centres on agriculture and animal husbandry. - Functional literacy training. Many participants cannot read, so literacy training is included in the LPAC Programme. - HIV/AIDS prevention. HIV and AIDS reduce incomes and rapidly increase poverty levels, so prevention activities are critical components of the LPAC Programme and UNICEF's anti-poverty efforts. - Construction of sanitary latrines. Because many households lack access to sanitary latrines, the LPAC Programme provides seed money to local communities for their construction at the household level.
UNICEF raises funds for Local Planning and Action for Children (LPAC) programme in China |
