Reduce rural poverty by creating sustainable incomes from a 'goat bank'

This project will create sustainable incomes for extremely poor participants who are often disabled, widowed or elderly, through the establishment of a Goat Bank.

The idea is of the "bank" is not lending money but lending goats.  A person receives a female goat and when offspring are born returns a female goat back to the bank, and is then free to sell the other offspring.

This project cost will cover:

• Equipment and supplies including purchase of goats, fencing of the goat raising area, start-up fund for goat enterprise,
• Monitoring and evaluation of goat banks
• Field operational costs, travel and transportation

Objective, aim and outcomes

Aim: To reduce poverty through developing agriculture and the rural economy.

Objective: To establish goat banks for extremely poor and disadvantaged persons

Outcomes: To create sustainable income for those villagers that cannot work in the fields through the sale of goats offspring.  This income will see that the target beneficiaries being able to contribute to the family income rather than burdening the family.

Background - why is this project needed?

Lao PDR is one of the poorest countries in SE Asia and Sayabouli is one of the country’s poorest districts. Resident villagers in remote areas of the Sayabouli district are primarily of Prai ethnicity and experience very high levels of poverty due to the fact that they have very few or no assets and their day-to-day survival depends almost exclusively on labour intensive agricultural activities.

The poorest households, mostly comprising widows, elderly and disabled people have very low labour capacity and therefore have greatest difficulty surviving and coping with extreme poverty.

As no welfare system exists, there is no way to buffer shocks such as illness, disability or death of one spouse within poor communities. The existing exception is “extended familial solidarity” but it often remains very limited given the high level of poverty in the area.

As a result, households with a low workforce capacity (resulting from a shock or societal disadvantage e.g. elderly, widowed or disabled) have the greatest difficulties  coping day-to-day or to disengage from this “poverty/ lack of labour force” spiral.

Partners/community involvement

The project partners with the district level government department of Agriculture to provide the technical input and training to the participating villages.  The village management committee (an existing structure) will also be a primary partner of the project and will be responsible for management of the goat raiser.

Consistent with local norms and systems the goat herding will be subcontracted to a village goat raiser.

Project fit into larger strategy or project

This project is a smaller component of a large project which is funded by the Swiss Development Committee (SDC).  This larger project has been implementing activities over the last 6 years with key activities focusing on increasing food security of poor and middle income households, and increasing Prai women’s and men’s ability to participate meaningfully in household and community development processes.

As far as livestock activities are concerned, the project aims to improve the capacity of villagers in terms of animal management (vaccination, treatment) and develop a commercial network of local animal service providers. In parallel, the project aims to increase the access to livestock assets especially for the poorest households.

Would you like to visit Laos with CARE Australia ?

If you are interested in further supporting CARE Australia's work in Laos, consider joining a cycle challenge; it will take you through the amazing sights that South East Asia has to offer, while providing opportunities to visit CARE's project sites and show you personally the difference that you are making to the lives of others.  Find out more...