We promote entrepreneurship and employment in the human settlements of Huaral, located on the northern periphery of the city of Lima, Peru.

These human settlements were born spontaneously as a result of the huge migration of people from the countryside to the capital in the 1980s. They are made up of thousands of informal dwellings that mostly lack the minimum conditions to live, without access to electricity, water, or public sanitation. Additionally, there is a lack of roads, transportation, and employment.

Families living in these areas are trying to develop economic ventures such as bakeries, masonries, transportation services, carpentry, phone booth stores, machinery and motorcycle repairs, and more.

In many cases, however, the lack of training on top of a lack of savings prevents the inhabitants of Huaral from launching their own ventures.

Through Huaral Emprende we offer:

• Training cycle for entrepreneurship: The CODESPA team will carry out a complete training cycle in aspects such as accounting, financial planning, or economic analysis.
• Creation of savings and credit groups: we create savings and credit groups that allow participants to have an initial seed capital, a sum of the small monthly contributions of all participants.

By building business capacities, savings, and promoting entrepreneurship, families of Huaral increase their income and improve their quality of life. 

“Thanks to the CODESPA project I trust in a better future for me and especially for my daughter. I’ve been able to see how my business idea has come true and the impact it has on my family and the community”, Magda Sullca Quispe.

Solidarity fund for COVID-19

The Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic is one of the most devastating events in the new millennium. Peru has more than 19 thousand confirmed cases in all regions, Lima being the region that concentrates the highest percentage (70%). This has affected the entire population, especially people with the greatest poverty and vulnerability, many of whom subsisted on small economic units that generate daily economic income.

Huaral Emprende has been underway since 2019. During that year, we have driven 65 ventures, 4 solidarity savings, and credit groups with 51 families and 50 young people have been trained, and some of them have found work in local companies.

National restrictions taken to contain the coronavirus have caused most ventures to close, the savings groups to stop momentarily, and the loss of many jobs. It is necessary to support the economic recovery of the families living in these settlements, prioritizing the entrepreneurship that can boost future generations and the local job market.

In response to this need, CODESPA will create a Solidarity Fund to channel emergency credits through the Savings Groups for families in Huaral. These credits will invest in them so they can re-launch their ventures or generate new business ideas. We will accompany them with specialized technical advice that allows them to quickly generate income and thereby return the requested credit according to the established deadlines.

The groups will manage, in total, a fund of 48,500 soles ($14,250), offering emergency credits to 97 families, with zero-interest-rate and with a flexible and fast grant, which will serve to recover their businesses or boost new ones.