Investing in ‘Peace through Loans’
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KosInvest and World Vision Kosovo will begin a unique project this
month, which aims to build on peacebuilding as a significant impact of microfinance in the ethnically divided province of Kosovo.
The 'Peace through Loans' project will create intentional opportunities for holistic economic and social development between the different communities.
'Recognising that economic opportunity is a powerful connector, this initiative is about connecting divided communities by establishing market links between them. Multi-ethnic economic partnerships will be created between ethnic communities as the first step of developing trust based relationships. On the basis of this new network of partnerships we will facilitate a process of identifying more sensitive community needs by community members themselves,' said Rick Spruyt, World Vision Civil Society Program Manager.
KosInvest, World Vision's microfinance institution in Kosovo, already recruits a multi-ethnic team of loans officers to work among the divided ethnic populations and slowly, market relationships have begun between the majority Albanian and minority Serb population. Usually, contact between these two groups is non-existent and there is still deep mistrust between them.
One example is a Serb client who established a fast food business through a KosInvest loan, who is now buying her bread and traditional cheese rolls from an Albanian supplier, explaining that it makes good business sense.
Moreover, more than 50 clients now have a guarantor of a different ethnicity.
Spruyt will be heading up the project in Rahovec / Orahovec where World Vision has worked hard in the post war years to build strong relationships on the ground with the local and international community, and religious leaders. The first post war multi-ethnic school was built by World Vision there and the Kids for Peace Project (KFP) is coordinated in the same town. Five years, 14 peace clubs and more than 350 children from different communities later, children's lives have been impacted in a way no other opportunity has allowed.
'It has helped us to escape the cage we found ourselves trapped in and strengthened us to work, associate and communicate with other children,' said one young KFP member.
With over 50 percent of the population under 25 years of age, World Vision Kosovo is now urgently proposing to further the work of KFP work with a 'Youth for Peace' initiative .Thus far, these young people have been left on the fringes of their fragile society, which is currently awaiting the outcome of a UN report on the final status of the troubled province.
Through 'Peace through Loans', World Vision and KosInvest are investing in a sustainable peace the way experience has shown them can work. Investing in bricks and mortar may not bring peace, but investing in people, their lives and their futures just might.
The 'Peace through Loans' project will create intentional opportunities for holistic economic and social development between the different communities.
'Recognising that economic opportunity is a powerful connector, this initiative is about connecting divided communities by establishing market links between them. Multi-ethnic economic partnerships will be created between ethnic communities as the first step of developing trust based relationships. On the basis of this new network of partnerships we will facilitate a process of identifying more sensitive community needs by community members themselves,' said Rick Spruyt, World Vision Civil Society Program Manager.
KosInvest, World Vision's microfinance institution in Kosovo, already recruits a multi-ethnic team of loans officers to work among the divided ethnic populations and slowly, market relationships have begun between the majority Albanian and minority Serb population. Usually, contact between these two groups is non-existent and there is still deep mistrust between them.
One example is a Serb client who established a fast food business through a KosInvest loan, who is now buying her bread and traditional cheese rolls from an Albanian supplier, explaining that it makes good business sense.
Moreover, more than 50 clients now have a guarantor of a different ethnicity.
Spruyt will be heading up the project in Rahovec / Orahovec where World Vision has worked hard in the post war years to build strong relationships on the ground with the local and international community, and religious leaders. The first post war multi-ethnic school was built by World Vision there and the Kids for Peace Project (KFP) is coordinated in the same town. Five years, 14 peace clubs and more than 350 children from different communities later, children's lives have been impacted in a way no other opportunity has allowed.
'It has helped us to escape the cage we found ourselves trapped in and strengthened us to work, associate and communicate with other children,' said one young KFP member.
With over 50 percent of the population under 25 years of age, World Vision Kosovo is now urgently proposing to further the work of KFP work with a 'Youth for Peace' initiative .Thus far, these young people have been left on the fringes of their fragile society, which is currently awaiting the outcome of a UN report on the final status of the troubled province.
Through 'Peace through Loans', World Vision and KosInvest are investing in a sustainable peace the way experience has shown them can work. Investing in bricks and mortar may not bring peace, but investing in people, their lives and their futures just might.
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
