Conditional grants
Supporting families
ARISE conditional grants are intended to help the recipients launch an income-generating activity and thereby improve family livelihoods.
As part of Family Support, ARISE distributes conditional grants to parents and guardians of children aged five to 15 who are most vulnerable to child labor. At the same time it also provides training to improve their businesses.
The grants are awarded under the following conditions:
- All school-age children of the beneficiary are enrolled and retained in school.
- The beneficiaries agree to participate in child labor monitoring or awareness raising.
Training
As part of the package, beneficiary mothers or guardians receive training that includes basic business skills to reinforce their capacity in small-business management, investment for growth, and leadership. Mothers or guardians are taught as individuals and as a group to foresee challenges, prepare business plans and budgets, diversify their enterprises and incomes, and build savings. The training also reinforces messages about the prevention of child labor, specific hazards related to agriculture and tobacco production, tobacco use, hazards in the household, the importance of education, and HIV/AIDS prevention.
The aim of the training is to increase income of workers of legal working age and to increase awareness of child labor, thereby enabling parents to apply more efficient technologies or hire adult farm support during high-labor tobacco production times instead of temporarily or permanently employing children.
Tailored distribution
ARISE takes a very tailored approach to the grant distribution. We look at the resources communities have and not the gaps. We also look at the willingness and ability for the mothers to work. Currently in Malawi for example, we provide savings club management training and seed capital investments. This helps operate village savings and loans schemes and to create a sustainable long-term sense of empowerment. It also makes funds available to the whole community and creates a ripple effect meaning more and more children will be able to go to school.
Mthyoka Village
In Mthyoka Village, Malawi, 30 vulnerable households were identified and provided a conditional grant to support their individual and group businesses.
