Enhancing the resilience of families affected by HIV/AIDS in Vietnam By Quyen Tran

1. Enhancing the resilience of families affected by HIV/AIDS in Vietnam By Quyen Tran HelpAge International XVIII International AIDS Conference

2. Issues: The large number of HIV infection is placing the older people in a vulnerable situation. They are becoming poorer as their children lose their jobs and or die, and are burdened with the role of care and upbringing of their orphaned grandchildren. However, few people and organisations in Vietnam are aware that older people have been and will beaffectedprofoundlybythe spread ofHIV/AIDS.

3. Description: The project (funded by BLF) support families affected by HIV/AIDS to: Form 60 Intergenerational Self-help Clubs (ISHCs) in 60 communities in 4 provinces ( each ISHC has around 50 to 70 members) Provide them training in community development and start up funding to set up their own self managed micro credit schemes Profit from the self managed micro credit is used to support the clubs’ activities.

4. SHC’s income Income sources Usage of income Micro-financing (interest) Membership fee Local Fund raising Usage of SHC’s income

5. 7. Evaluation of the multi-functional Intergenerational Self-help Club (ISHCs) Benefits from having regular self-generated income • ISHCs are more community led • ISHCs are able to design, implement and monitor its only activities • ISHCs are financially sustainable and able to generate increasing income to cover it own running cost and activities • ISHCs are dynamic and able to change and grow

6. Results Self managed micro credit and Saving Component: As of June 2009 the project has • given out 2,714 loans (from the project and local government funds) to start up small Business, farming, animal husbandry, handicraft production, food processing, and other households IGAs • repayment rate of 99.7% and generate on average 70 USD income per month per ISHC • created/found works for 476 PLHA • increased annual income of club members by 55.4% as compare to before the project (out of 3,501 members) • given regular support to 1,702 AIDS orphans (in cash and in-kind supports) • Recruited and support 877 volunteers to provide care to 1,354 homecare clients

7. Lessons Learned • Ensuring the SHCs self-generated regular income is critical to promote local ownership and the sustainability of the SHCs • Families affected by HIV/AIDS are bankable. Their repayment rates are as high as any other group (99.7% over a period of 4 yrs). • Older carers are important unrecognized resources for providing sustainable care and support for PLWHA & OVCs • Empowering families and CBOs (SHCs) to care for themselves is effective in mitigating the impact of HIV/AIDS • The SHC approach is very cost effective (require only 10,000 USD to setup and support them to be sustainable.)

8. Sustainability and replication of the SHC Model for family affected by HIV/AIDS One year after the project end: 91 SHCs Beginning of the project: 60 SHCs End of project: 67 SHCs 2005 2009 2010

9. Next Steps The project has shown that families affected by HIV/AIDS can be resilience. They are able to take a lead in mitigating the impact of HIV/AIDS. Therefore, programmes and policies should focus on increasing the capacity and resilience of the families affected by HIV/AIDS as one of their primary strategy. In order to do achieve this, the project needs to: • Improve the documentation and sharing of the project successful model • influence policy makers and donors to provide funding for wider replication of the model

10. For more information go to: www.helpage.org