Enterprising for Development Rationale for the project: Despite recent growth, Vietnam is a country with continued levels of poverty, particularly for specific marginalized groups in rural areas. In particular, small scale farmers, youth and women suffer from low and instable incomesituations. By the end of 2012, the number of unemployed people at the age of 15 to 24 accounted for 45.7 percent of the total of unemployed workers in Vietnam, and this proportion was even higher (53.2 percent) in rural areas. To combat poverty in Vietnam, increasing the net income gains in agricultural production for small scale farmers and creating more job opportunities for young people in rural areas is key. Small and Medium Size Enterprise (SME) development in rural areas targeted at strengthening the position of small scale farmers in the value chain and engaging youth and women could potentially be an answer. However, despite the fact that many new SMEsare established, few manage to survive. Those led by women and/or youth show a lower success rate than others. The main blockages for SME survival and growth is a lack of growth finance, with many SMEs having difficulty accessing bank loans as most of them do nothave collaterals as well as long business track records. Additionally, many SMEs lackbusiness knowledge and skills, particularly inthe area of governance, financial accounting and marketing. Although the attention for social entrepreneurship is slowly increasingin Vietnam, the awareness on how to run a business in a socially and environmentally sustainable way is still limited. On 26 November 2014, the revised Laws on Enterprise have been passed, and a Social Enterprise (SE) is recognized as a legal enterprise in Vietnam. This is the right time to invest in the success of a new generation of Vietnamese entrepreneurs, who will contribute to their society with both economic and social returns. With its long standing experience in Vietnam, good partner network and open communication with the Vietnamese government, Oxfam is in a good position to reach the ambitious targets set.
Goal and Objectives: The overall goal is for small-scale farmers, women and youth directly benefitting from the project to have better access to employment, see theirincomes increase, and have more access to relevant products and services to empower them. The first specific objective of this project is to increase SMEs financial and social sustainability and impact. Secondly, the project aims to influence the social and political environment to ensure a more enabling environment for future sustainable SME growth (particularly of social enterprises). The project expects to achieve indirect outcomes in the different value chains the SMEs operate in, e.g. in terms of employment and compliance with social and environmental standards at supplier level. For the theory of change of the project see annex 1. In light of the sustainability of the project Oxfam and CSIP aim to make the support delivered to SME more financially sustainable for the future by exploring the roomfor direct contributions of SME and raising funds from impact investors for valuable investment lead generation. Lessons learned in this programme will inform future business modeling for CSIP and Oxfam for the longer term.
Beneficiaries: The direct beneficiaries of the project are on the one hand the 30 entrepreneurs (and their management staff) of the various SME that will participate in the programme. The project aims to specifically target young and/or female entrepreneurs. More important than the entrepreneurs, are the 6000 people living in poverty (suppliers/farmers and employees of the SME) who will directly benefit from theprogramme due to increased income resulting from the existence and survival of the SMEs targeted. Indirectly, another 18,000 people(members of the households of the direct beneficiaries are impacted. SMEs will be carefully selected on the basis of a number of selection criteria assessing the entrepreneurs for their business and social drive (see annex 2 for the exclusion andselection criteria).