The Alok Institute and the NGO Acreditar have created the Fundo Conexão Empreendedora, a microcredit fund, with the purpose of creating an environment of opportunities for the strengthening and/or creation of small businesses in the region of the “zona da mata” of Pernambuco, Brazil.
The project strengthens and encourages the structuring of productive activities, through microcredit and support for businesses and entrepreneurial spirit, contributing to income generation, gender equality, and local development.
Fotos: Mila Petrillo, Produtora Pavão, Arquivo Acreditar
The Conexão Empreendedora Fund has already directly contributed to 249 businesses led by young people and women providing microcredit and offering support and assistance in business management.
A total of 247 new job positions was created, meaning that the partnership between Acreditar and Alok Institute benefited 496 individuals. Notably, 83.78% of these businesses are managed by women who see entrepreneurship as an opportunity to generate their own income. Among them, 22.29% are young entrepreneurs aged between 18 and 32 years.
The Fund operates in 5 cities in the interior of Pernambuco, located in the Northeast region of Brazil. The cities are: Glória do Goitá, Pombos, Lagoa de Itaenga, Chã de Alegria and Feira Nova.
Supported businesses operate in urban or rural environments on the following areas:
– Commerce (56.76%): clothing sales, fruits and vegetables, cosmetics, etc.
– Services (8.11%): beauty salons, eyebrow design, manicures, jingle recording, etc.
– Production (16.22%): fabric painting, crochet, production of sweets, cakes, bread, etc.
– Rural Activities (18.92%): cultivation of vegetables, hennery, pigs, goats, cultivation of potatoes, corn, etc.
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Credit and Monitoring
Acreditar’s methodology associates the granting of microcredit with systemic financial education and guidance to popular entrepreneurs, so that through their own businesses, they can remain and generate wealth for the region.
About 75% of the microcredit portfolio is requested by women who are starting or already doing business in the fields of food, health, beauty or agriculture. The evidence of the positive impacts of business on the lives of families, especially their children, led Acreditar to make the issue of gender a priority in its scope of action.
Foto: Arquivo
About Acreditar:
Acreditar is a non-profit microfinance institution (IMF), qualified as an OSCIP-d Civil Society Organization of Public Interest. Founded in 2006, with the purpose of promoting local development, it works with oriented productive microcredit and entrepreneurship, contributing to the strengthening of local businesses.
Acreditar’s work allows entrepreneurs in the region to live with dignity in their homelands, not needing to migrate to other regions of Brazil.