'LifeWorks' Youth Enterprise Development (YED): A ROAD to HIV Prevention and Mitigation in Bukavu, DRC

This report is the result of a rapid assessment conducted by Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC) in collaboration with Family Health International (FHI) in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in August 2008. With the support of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and under the Cross-Sectoral Youth (CSY) Project, EDC and FHI carried out the assessment. In doing so, these organisations built upon the Regional Outreach Addressing AIDS through Development Strategies (ROADS) programme, which is an HIV/AIDS prevention initiative currently implemented by FHI in the DRC and neighbouring countries. The assessment had a dual purpose: (i) to assess entrepreneurship opportunities for youth in Bukavu and (ii) to design an entrepreneurship project to be incorporated into ROADS to strengthen livelihood skills and opportunities for youth in Bukavu.

Part I of the document includes local background, assessment approach and methodology, and overall findings gathered during a one-week assessment. Part II describes the elements of an entrepreneurship component to be implemented in Bukavu by EDC and FHI over 12 months. It is hoped that the newly designed project will combine HIV/AIDS prevention and entrepreneurship activities in such a way that young participants will receive sufficient income from their livelihoods activities in order to contribute to a reduction in their high-risk behaviours towards HIV vulnerability.

Specifically, as a means of reducing vulnerability to higher-risk survival strategies such as prostitution, ROADS seeks to support individual youth entrepreneurs to strengthen their fledgling businesses in Bukavu by providing increasingly tailored business development training. Created by USAID/East Africa and managed by FHI, ROADS works in 26 vulnerable communities along the transport corridors of 8 countries in East and Central Africa. These transport corridors and their border and stop-over communities are economic hubs and HIV transmission networks. ROADS has developed a cluster model to maximise programme reach by expanding participation and collective action of small, sustainable, indigenous volunteer groups with similar focus and interests. Since 2005, ROADS has been working at 3 Bukavu sites (Major Vangu, Nyamugo, and Ofida) with 23 indigenous youth associations that form 3 Youth Cluster groups consisting of both in-school youth from 22 local secondary and tertiary institutions and out-of-school youth, including street youth, AIDS orphans and vulnerable youth, ex-combatants, teenage mothers, and sex workers. The clusters mobilise youth for HIV prevention using participatory theatre and other methodologies, promoting counselling and voluntary testing, undertaking home visits for persons living with HIV and AIDS, sensitising community members on gender-based violence (GBV) and alcohol abuse, providing condom distribution outlets, and referring persons to local HIV/AIDS services.

In August 2008, EDC and FHI sent a joint team of 3 specialists to Bukavu to conduct a 3-part assessment built upon 3 components:

1. In-depth focus group discussions (FGDs) with youth participating in the ROADS Youth Clusters of their present or desired economic activities, basic needs, and resources for meeting them.

• The findings from the FGDs indicate that most current business activities conducted by youth reflect local market conditions and are itinerant. Although participants cited the need for a good, well-thought-through idea, few had any form of written business plan. Most were operating primarily on intuition and with short-term planning to cover immediate needs. The majority of youth had received no specific business training. Although a few of the more-educated youth mentioned using simple leaflets for advertising, most business marketing was via word-of-mouth only. Few youth had applied for credit from local financial service providers. Prostitution was cited as the first source of financing for many young women. (One explanation given was that parents usually invest more in boys than in girls to start small businesses.) The FGD exercises supported data from other countries showing the relationship between economic empowerment and increased ability to negotiate safe sex. There is a need to couple economic strengthening interventions with confidence-building activities and training in personal assertiveness and decision-making. These are current activities under the ROADS peer education training curriculum.

2. An assessment of the local business market, working by sector with representative small- and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) and large-scale enterprises to determine demand and capacity for a range of products and services, constraints to business growth, and need for products or services that youth could be supported to provide.

• No single Youth Cluster member referred to having received any type of advice from a local Business Development Service (BDS) provider. Parents were cited as the main source of business advice, followed by other family members and friends. Youth members remained ignorant of the option of accessing structured business training, except for vocational training, and only one person was able to name a local BDS provider - namely, GEL (Guichet d'économie locale), a local non-governmental organisation (NGO) providing entrepreneurial and management training as well as coaching for business plan development and follow-up. GEL has experience in training low-literate youth and using participative methodologies.
  
• Evaluators found that the "regulatory environment within the DRC as a whole remains a significant obstacle to doing business, with the country receiving the lowest rating of all 178 countries assessed in the World Bank's 'Doing Business' report for 2008." Furthermore, significant infrastructure challenges face the business sector, along with all residents of Bukavu.
  
• Taking into account the business context and challenges in Bukavu, the team identified initial 8 criteria for matching market opportunities for youth enterprises (e.g., activity must offer potential for significant engagement by youth, particularly young women) and 6 criteria for rapid evaluation of specific sub-sectors (e.g., any business partner must be ethical in business and must show demonstrated commitment to social development).

3. An assessment of the current involvement of local SMEs and large businesses with youth, and level and type of interest in participating in a youth livelihoods support project.

• As a result of interviews held with small-, medium- and large-scale enterprises and NGOs working along key value chains in the Bukavu market, the FHI/EDC team identified a number of areas for potential growth or market entry for youth that would meet the majority of the above screening criteria. These include: soap making, bakery, retail store operations, motorcycle-taxi repair service, pig farming, mushroom farming, and construction materials production.

The FHI/EDC assessment team also spoke with managers of 5 donor-supported and/or international NGO (INGO)-run programmes supporting livelihoods development, with a focus on micro and small business. None specifically focuses on youth for livelihoods support as individual business operators, but 2 of them appear to be reaching youth with livelihoods support (e.g., credit, training, or capital grants) and could provide leverage for the proposed project.

Part II of the document includes the proposed intervention and project activities, project management structure, and monitoring and evaluation framework that will guide the implementation of the project in Bukavu during a 12-month period. The project will use several distinct, business-capacity-building approaches, based on best practice methodologies and wider sustainability of the project. These will include:

• Training of trainers (TOT): GEL will train a number of coaches, drawn from the Youth Cluster associations, who will provide ongoing support and technical advice to the emerging Cross-Sectoral Youth (CSY) Project - DRC: LifeWorks Youth Enterprise Development entrepreneurs.
• Use of existing systems and structures: Youth entrepreneurs will form Business Clubs within the three existing sites of the ROADS project and use these to receive training and build on existing peer support mechanisms.
• Maintenance of HIV-related peer activities by youth entrepreneurs: The HIV training is intended to complement the business skills training, in order to increase negotiating power of youth in sexual encounters.
• Involvement by Youth Cluster groups in decision-making: Cluster groups will be consulted from the beginning of the project. For example, they will be consulted when developing participant selection criteria and they will contribute to the selection of applicants.
• Capacity-building: An underlying value of the project will be its capacity to serve youth entrepreneurs who are able to contribute to the local economy meaningfully but are often locked out of the services they require to turn potential into reality. The project seeks to build upon entrepreneurial characteristics of dynamism, opportunity taking, and positive attitude and enhance them. Similarly, the project will seek to engage with local or regional BDS providers wherever possible in order to develop local capacity of these providers. The TOT for coaches in entrepreneurship skills will take place at 3 different levels with the intention of building the capacity of project staff, the institution (FHI), and local community members with high levels of motivation to volunteer.
• Use of proven training methodologies for youth: Training materials will be vetted for youth-friendliness and accessibility for low literacy audiences. Existing good practice training manuals will be consulted for adaptation where appropriate and possible.
• Meaningful private sector support: The proposed business support project will appeal to the corporate social responsibility agenda of such companies, while targeting requests for strong business managers to act as mentors for technical support to youth. It is anticipated that as the project progresses and participating private sector companies develop more positive perceptions of youth, they will offer employment opportunities or internships. The civic engagement component will also strive to strengthen the private sector engagement with youth.
  

Specifically, the proposed project will start with initial and basic orientation training in entrepreneurship for 100 young people who are currently involved in some level of economic activity, and will include a business simulation game. These youth will be selected against project criteria which include at least 60% young women and 60% less-educated youth. In order to maintain a link with elements of the wider ROADS HIV interventions, only those youth who are currently active in ROADS HIV activities will be considered for participation. The pre-existing Youth Cluster Steering Committee will meet and propose additional criteria and will then select the initial cadre of 100 youth.

Next, the 100 young people will be invited to submit a 2-page description of a business idea. Of these, 60 will be selected based on market relevance, representation of group involved (e.g, at least 60% girls as entrepreneurs), and potential for growth. The youth submitting the 60 selected ideas will enter a training and coaching process designed to help them refine the business ideas and develop a business plan for implementing them. At this stage, youth will receive more focused business training from GEL. A key aspect of the existing ROADS project has been its ability to draw upon indigenous community volunteer activities. To build on this, organisers will identify coaches from within the youth associations which form the clusters. Criteria for coaches will include selecting older youth (suggested above 25 years) and those who have been running a sustainable business for at least one year. Coaches will be differentiated from mentors. The latter will be those persons drawn from the local business community and able to provide to youth enterprises technical support in specific areas of business or sectoral expertise.

The 60 participants will submit their business plans for assessment; those 20 whose business plans are selected for further support will attend more formal entrepreneur workshops given by GEL. Training will address skills including managing within a business plan, financial management, quality management, order management, and governance issues. Following training, each participant will be visited by his/her coach. Awards will then be made to those 20 enterprises, and will take the form of start-up capital investment grants or direct purchase of equipment. The project will develop linkages with local microfinance service providers and will encourage youth to make contact with these agencies directly. Follow-up support will be provided to award-receiving youth entrepreneurs through the direct intervention of the FHI Youth Enterprise Development Officer (DO) in Bukavu, through support provided by coaches and mentors, and through encouragement of youth entrepreneurs themselves to access additional sources of business support.

A number of activities will include all 100 participants in order to help them build their ideas, skills, and knowledge in small and micro business development. Youth will form Business Clubs at each cluster site to offer the opportunity for youth-to-youth support in business development and to enhance the existing philosophy and practice of the wider ROADS life skills programming. ROADS has trained youth in peer education using a curriculum including various aspects of life skills development, such as decision-making, personal risk analysis, crisis management, communication skills, self-esteem, and negotiation skills. Models of local savings schemes will be introduced as an activity of the Business Clubs to encourage both business and personal savings: the former to assist with business development, the latter to assist with life planning. Choice of the most appropriate savings scheme will be participatory and the structure, governance model, and savings and credit rates will be determined by each Business Club. Coaches will meet regularly with the youth to give them individualised advice. Those youth who do not show sufficient entrepreneurial flair will be given priority for employment opportunities arising within programme-supported youth-run businesses. Private sector businesses will be encouraged to hire youth as well.

To strengthen private sector involvement and overall civic engagement, the project anticipates conducting 3-4 service days during which mentors and youth from each project site will jointly carry out a targeted community service activity. The identification of the activity, the planning, and execution will be led by youth themselves. This activity will also help create a horizontal relationship between business representatives and youth.

Following an outline of the project management scheme, this document outlines plans for monitoring and evaluation (M&E). In brief, the first step will be to conduct a baseline study among those youth in the ROADS Youth Clusters who took part in the FGDs conducted in Bukavu. In addition, quarterly data collection by ROADS Bukavu staff will be done in the field among participating Youth Clusters, using a questionnaire-based data collection tool structured to capture net change in the indicators drawn from the Results Framework and found to be measurable in the baseline study. At the end of the project period, an external consultant will conduct an End of Project (EOP) assessment. The assessment will focus on questions such as: is this a model that USAID and its Missions could use in designing similar cross-sectoral programmes? The EOP assessment will also address any measurable net change at the levels of (a) youth involvement in income- and employment-generating enterprises, (b) youth acquisition of business and personal life skills, (c) youth involvement in civil society programmes, and (d) changes in youth high-risk behaviours related to HIV/AIDS. The report  will also address changes in levels and types of private sector (business) involvement in supporting youth enterprise development.