STEP UP's vision is to foster a significant increase in practitioners' capacities to assist large numbers of the ultra poor to move out of extreme poverty.
Member Spotlight
Luckshmi Sivalingam works in DAI’s Economic Growth sector, where she focuses on inclusive economic growth, access to finance, and pro-poor agriculture value chain development. She also currently manages DAI’s agriculture and health linkages practice. She was recently named 2012 Practitioner of the Year by SEEP for her leadership and valuable contributions within STEP-UP and other learning initiatives.
Webinars
Please join SEEP’s Market Facilitation (MaFI) Working Group and Strengthening the Economic Potential of the Ultra Poor (STEP UP) Initiative for a series of webinars on the recently launched “Integrating Very Poor Producers Into Value Chains Field Guide.” The first two webinars were held in November 2012 and February 2013 and the recordings can be found below:
- Webinar 1: Key considerations for integrating the very poor into value chains
- Webinar 2: Innovative strategies for facilitating vertical linkages with very poor producers
The third and final webinar will be held on May 23, 2013 at 9 AM EDT. For more information including how to join, please click here.
Rationale
A number of recent programs and projects have demonstrated success in moving households out of extreme poverty, but they have been relatively small-scale and questions remain about cost, sustainability and impact. It has also been difficult to contextualize successes – are certain approaches that seem to work actually working and under what conditions can they be replicated? The STEP UP initiative recognizes the importance of analyzing and sharing existing successes and failures, synthesizing lessons learned, and promoting collaboration and partnerships to improve and expand work of practitioners in this vital area. The timing is right for this effort – the need, supply and demand for knowledge about how to support the ultra poor in their efforts to transform their lives is increasingly widespread among development practitioners, policymakers, and funders.
- The economic strengthening sector has a NEED TO IMPROVE its efforts to move the poorest of the world out of poverty.
- There is a significant and growing SUPPLY of knowledge and documentation on this topic, but it has yet to be consolidated and widely shared.
- There is DEMAND among practitioners for practical design, implementation and evaluation resources.
STEP UP MODEL FOR IMPROVING OUTCOMES FOR THE ULTRA POOR
