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World Council awarded new USAID program to stimulate affordable housing market in Haiti
MADISON, WI (July 10, 2015) — The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has awarded World Council the Home Ownership and Mortgage Expansion (HOME) Program to catalyze the housing finance sector to create access to affordable housing for average Haitian households.
USAID/Haiti and World Council, with its partners Habitat for Humanity International and the Affordable Housing Institute, have developed a program to work directly with Haitian financial institutions and housing developers to support initiatives that will create and strengthen affordable housing financial products and services in Haiti. The end goal is to make this a Haitian-led and owned initiative.
Since 2009, World Council has helped Haitian financial institutions expand access to agricultural and rural finance through its flagship USAID-funded HIFIVE program. With the new HOME Program, World Council and its partners will focus on improving the housing finance market.
Haitian neighborhoods, especially in the capital Port-au-Prince, suffered significant damage from the 2010 earthquake. The shortage of affordable housing in Haiti is still a major concern more than five years later.
Access to affordable, safe and durable housing is critical to saving lives in Haiti. Situated between the North American and Caribbean tectonic plates and directly on the region’s hurricane track, the country must continually weather storms, floods and earthquakes.
Following the 2010 earthquake, the U.S. Government, in close collaboration with the Government of Haiti, developed a housing strategy to build short-term shelters and longer-term greenfield homes. Based on successes and lessons learned from this approach, USAID/Haiti now looks at the entire housing value chain to find a sustainable solution to the affordable housing shortage in Haiti.
“World Council and its partners are excited to spur the development of innovative housing finance products for low and middle income Haitians, who previously had little to no access to affordable housing,” said Peter Graves, World Council Senior Vice President of Technical Services.
HOME will be led by Mr. Duane Kissick, a well-known affordable housing expert with extensive experience in affordable housing, urban development and housing finance. For the last five years, he has worked with Government of Haiti counterparts, Haitian construction companies, developers and financial institutions.
About USAID
The U.S. Agency for International Development administers the U.S. foreign assistance program providing economic and humanitarian assistance in more than 80 countries worldwide.
About World Council of Credit Unions
World Council is the leading international trade association and development agency for the promotion of credit unions and financial inclusion. With 45 years of experience, World Council promotes economic security, resilience and livelihoods strengthening through expanding access to finance, value chain finance, and field agent banking to reach marginalized and traditionally unbanked populations. We combine the fundamentals of financial services with new technology to help financial institutions reach poor people in rural and remote areas. For the past six years through the USAID-funded Haiti Integrated Finance for Value Chains and Enterprises (HIFIVE) program, World Council has been working with the Haitian financial sector to develop their capacity to deliver existing and new financial services and products.
World Council has implemented more than 290 technical assistance programs in 71 countries. Worldwide, 57,000 credit unions in 105 countries serve 217 million people. Learn more about World Council’s impact around the world at www.woccu.org.