Program Details: China

Sixteen-year-old Hu Yan, the daughter of a migrant family, is enrolled at the Dandelion School on the outskirts of burgeoning Beijing. Photo: Thatcher Cook for Mercy Corps

Behind the headlines about China's skyrocketing economic growth and thriving middle class is a more complicated story of entire regions that continue to live in desperate poverty. More than 160 million Chinese are still living on less that one dollar per day, often without access to clean water, arable land, or adequate health and education services.

Mercy Corps is committed to working with those who have not yet seen the benefits of China's economic growth. Since 2001, Mercy Corps has been investing in vulnerable communities through microfinance programs that offer start-up capital and technical assistance to enterprising low-income people.

The agency's goal in China is to foster the development of new and existing civil society initiatives, as well as building and strengthening the capacity of local non-governmental organizations for responses to domestic and regional needs. Mercy Corps also seeks to develop strong networks and links among the business, academic and public sectors, all with the aim of promoting good governance and corporate social responsibility, bringing peace and stability to the broader East Asia region.

So far, approximately 60,000 people in China have benefited from Mercy Corps' small loans and training, using that support to turn their aspirations into assets.

Programs in Focus

Project G.L.O.W.: Giving Leadership Opportunities to Young Women
With support from the Nike Foundation, Mercy Corps is addressing key social issues for youth of the Yi ethnic minority group in Sichuan Province. We are working together with the Liangshan Yi For Empowerment (LYFE) Center, a local non-governmental organization, to equip and empower Yi adolescent girls with the life skills, health awareness and economic options necessary to cope and move beyond the challenges of urban migration and the growing HIV/AIDS epidemic.

The project targets adolescent girls ages 10-18 with activities that focus on education, economic opportunities and health.

School to Work Project: Opportunities for Urban Migrant Youth
The School to Work Project will provide employment skills and livelihood options to migrant youth living in poverty in China's economically thriving city of Beijing. Increasing numbers of families have moved to the city with the hope of escaping the cycle of poverty in China's rural villages. These families are scrambling to stay afloat and are operating without safety nets. Their children are marginalized by these conditions, and without targeted interventions face a future of poverty and insecurity.

Mercy Corps and the local non-profit Dandelion School - the only secondary school in Beijing serving adolescent migrant youth - have partnered to improve the quality of life and economic future of 50 youth (aged 14-18) through intensive vocational/life skills training and apprenticeships. The project has the expressed support of the Beijing Department of Labor, which is looking to replicate and scale up this model into other schools and community centers serving migrant families in Beijing.

Rural Community Development for Poverty Alleviation in Liuzhi, Guizhou
Mercy Corps is assisting rural farming communities in this impoverished part of China through the provision of micro-loans and vocational training to farmers living under the poverty line. This project provides capacity-building support to a local partner organization, China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation (CFPA), enabling it to serve a client base of more than 8,000 beneficiaries and achieve operational self-sufficiency in four years.

Rural Community Development for Poverty Alleviation in Xiapu, Fujian
The program aims to significantly reduce poverty and support the development of a viable microfinance institution in Xiapu County, Fujian Province over a four year period. At the same time, it seeks to strengthen the capacity of both CFPA and local staff through the provision of training in internationally accepted best practices and technical assistance. The project increases available funding for microfinance loans, creating viable livelihood opportunities for 1,200 low-income households in the rural county of Xiapu.