The Entrepreneurial Connection Fund is an initiative of the Alok Institute in partnership with Acreditar, created in 2021 to foster small businesses growth in the Zona da Mata region of Pernambuco. The project provides microcredit and ongoing support to local entrepreneurs, focusing on income generation, gender equality, and sustainable local development.
The initiative has already supported over 300 small businesses, the majority led by women (74%) and young people (56%), resulting in a 56% increase in income for female entrepreneurs. In addition to providing access to credit, the project also offers business management support and fosters an entrepreneurial mindset.
Fotos: Mila Petrillo, Produtora Pavão, Arquivo Acreditar
The businesses supported by the Entrepreneurial Connection Fund are distributed across the following sectors:
- Commerce: 69.57%
- Services: 8.70%
- Production: 8.70%
- Rural Activities: 13.04%
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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.
