Over the past decade, WN has maintained consistency in our methodology and adapting to evidence-based techniques.
The organization works with the poorest, most marginalized communities for an average of eight to ten years. Instead of quick fixes that rely on external inputs, we support patient, persistent training and capacity-building. This long-term commitment ensures that when World Neighbors graduates a community, that community possesses the skills, institutions, and confidence to sustain progress independently.
WN believes that to truly institute sustainable change, you cannot solve one problem in isolation. We understand that issues like poverty, hunger, disease, gender bias, vulnerability to disaster and climate change are interrelated.
For example, if you are not healthy, you cannot work productively on your farm. If you cannot farm, you do not produce enough food or earn enough money to buy food or to pay for health services. If you try to grow more food by buying fertilizer, but do not find ways to prevent soil erosion and tree cutting, your fertilizer will be washed away. If you improve the water supply in a village for potable water but don’t help the village organize itself to maintain the water systems, the water system will break down.
While each community determines its own unique needs, solutions and priorities, all have ongoing programs in the areas of:
1) Sustainable Agriculture
2) Rural Livelihoods
3) Community and Reproductive Health
4) Natural Resource Management
5) Gender Equity
Through sustainable agriculture, World Neighbors helps communities develop forms of food production that are economically viable, ecologically sound, socially just and supportive of rural culture.
Farming is the primary occupation in WN’s communities, all located in rural areas. Our programs help farmers yield more from their crops, livestock and fish farming operations, while adapting to climate change. Farmer experimentation with simple techniques, and farmer-to-farmer sharing of successes, are central to our methodology.
An example of a World Neighbors’ sustainable agriculture program is in Bihar, India where women farmers are transforming their traditional kitchen gardens by experimenting with new ideas such as seasonal planting and multilayer beds. These changes are boosting household food supply, improving diets, and giving women a stronger voice in local agricultural decisions.
WN supports communities to form savings and credit groups where people come together, and each contributes a small sum of money. From this pooled fund, small loans are made and repaid with interest, providing an increasing source of funding for income-generating activities, educating children or other family needs.
Rural livelihood programs also support community members in developing small businesses. This initiative also includes expanding access to markets and improving bargaining power.
In Burkina Faso and Mali, women’s savings groups are turning shea butter into a pathway to stronger livelihoods. With trainings on better extraction, quality refinement and proper tools, they are turning a traditional activity into steady income. This boosts their financial independence and strengthens their voice at home and in the community. At the same time, women are learning to protect shea trees and manage the land sustainably, building both economic and environmental resilience.
The communities where WN and its partners work lack health services, roads, healthy soil and clean water. Community health in these villages is also affected by the political economy, violence, corruption and cultural traditions.
WN works together with the community, integrating their needs for improved agricultural production, improved nutrition, income generation and good health.
The essential premise of WN community health programming is that all families have the right to live in a clean and safe environment with access to clean water, sanitation, adequate food and access to health services and health education.
In Malawi, mobile health clinics bring essential care to remote communities. Children are weighed and vaccinated, families get malaria tests, and women access reproductive health services. By coming directly to the villages, these clinics make care easier to reach and help families stay healthy.
Community-based natural resource management is a people-centered approach to the integration of conservation of the natural resource base (water, soil, trees and local biodiversity) and development to overcome poverty, hunger and disease.
Recognizing the interdependence of community well-being and ecosystem health, WN strengthens the capacity of communities to have a voice in decisions about planning and design of conservation initiatives affecting them.
The natural environment plays a huge role in the health and welfare of people who rely on it as their sole source of income and food. Communities depend on the land to provide them with enough food to feed their families through the year and enough money so that they can afford medical care, clothing and shelter.
Changing climates often make ecosystems less predictable, leaving people that rely on those ecosystems vulnerable. WN works to help people adjust to these changes.
In Peru’s Apurímac and Ayacucho regions, communities are restoring mountain springs with native trees that hold water and revive the ecosystem. They’re also building qochas, traditional earthen dams, which increase water availability and have boosted crop production by 20%.
Throughout the countries where WN works, traditional social mores and lack of education limit the ways women can contribute to their families and communities.
This is compounded in many communities by the emigration of men for wage work, which leaves the women with all the family, farm and household responsibilities. WN’s programs empower women through women led savings and credit groups, which build skills in leadership, financial literacy, management and entrepreneurship. Just as important, group members find a supportive and encouraging community of their peers.
Gender equity cuts across each of WN’s program areas because empowering all people is key to ensuring the health and prosperity of entire families and communities.
In Timor Leste, savings and credit groups, made up largely of women, are pairing financial literacy with micro enterprise mentoring, helping women launch and grow small businesses while increasing their role in household and community decision making.
