San Carlos, California, January 5, 2016--The United Nations Federal Credit Union (UNFCU) Foundation announced yesterday that it has awarded Village Enterprise with a grant to jump-start new small businesses in Northern Uganda through its pioneering microenterprise Graduation program. Village Enterprise was selected along with several other notable organizations including Trickle Up, the United Nations Women’s Guild and the Khalid Hosseini Foundation, whose purposes are aligned with the new UN Sustainable Development Goals.

“The UNFCU Foundation is thrilled to support the impactful work of Village Enterprise and further its mission to end extreme poverty in rural Africa through entrepreneurship and innovation in Northern Uganda” said Pamela Agnone, president and director of UNFCU Foundation.

Village Enterprise works in remote rural areas of East Africa where almost half of the population lives below the extreme poverty line of less that $1.25 per day. The Village Enterprise Graduation program targets and provides these ultrapoor first-time entrepreneurs with seed capital, training and access to savings. 

“Since our inception in 1987, Village Enterprise has started more than 33,000 businesses, trained more than 136,000 entrepreneurs and improved the lives of more than 650,000 women, children and men,” noted Village Enterprise’s CEO Dianne Calvi.  “We are honored to be partnering with the UNFCU Foundation to expand our program to empower women in extreme poverty in Northern Uganda through microenterprise development.”

About UNFCU: The UNFCU Foundation is a New York-based, non-profit corporation established in 2014 by the United Nations Federal Credit Union (UNFCU).

About Village Enterprise: A recipient of Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Next Century Innovators Award in 2013, Village Enterprise will start more than 3,200 small businesses in 2016, ranging from livestock, farming, small retail stores and restaurants, to tailoring, and beekeeping.

To learn more, visit www.villageenteprise.org and follow Village Enterprise on Twitter at and on Facebook.

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Press Contact: Lucy Valentine Wurtz, Tel. +1 650 303 4126

lucyw@villageenterprise.org