Quarterly Report FY21Q1 – October 1st to December 31st, 2020

The project is funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and is part of the Supporting High Potential MSMEs program. The project's goal is supported by three intervention objectives and corresponding components, which provide direct support through competitive pay-for-performance contracts with selected subcontractors to deliver business advisory support and workforce development services, as well as engage financial institutions to promote the development and strengthening of financial products and services, including digital financial services for MSMEs. During the first quarter of the project, MEDA primarily focused on setting up the project and submitting key project deliverables, including the Gender Integration and Social Inclusion Strategy (GISIS), Year 1 Implementation Plan, and the Monitoring Evaluation Research and Learning (MERL) Plan. All documents were submitted within the allowed timeframe, and the Implementation and MERL plan was under review by Haiti's USAID Mission as of the end of Q1. On December 15th, 2020, MEDA successfully launched the ATTEINDRE program via a virtual public launch on Zoom, which included 95 participants and was marked by speeches from the ATTEINDRE Chief of Party, USAID Mission Director, and the Governor of the Central Bank of Haiti. No implementation challenges were encountered during the quarter, and most meetings with potential partners to promote the project were held over the phone from the onset. MEDA also launched the ATTEINDRE Grant Fund by issuing a Request for Expressions of Interest to the public, and as of December 31st, 2020, ATTEINDRE has received 35 expressions of interest from entities wishing to participate in the program as partners. Among these 35 entities, MEDA noted the following relevant partners per its targets: 2 ICT firms, 3 microfinance institutions, 1 microfinance association, 3 credit unions, 1 credit union federation, 16 business advisory support and workforce development services providers, 3 local organizations who advocate for matters of gender and social inclusion, financial education, and financial literacy, 1 New York-based, Haitian-diaspora-owned investment firm, 1 commercial bank, and 1 agricultural cooperative. The project's Theory of Change is that if a network of qualified and gender-aware business advisory and workforce development service providers support the formalization and/or modernization of underserved MSMEs and a network of financial service providers would develop and provide services tailored to their needs, then MSMEs would operate in an enabling environment oriented to their long-term growth and conducive to job creation and inclusive economic growth. The ATTEINDRE project includes three objectives connected to the vision of an ecosystem of business support services and financial service providers serving the MSME sector and contributing to a competitive market system. The objectives are tied to the key project components identified by MEDA to address MSME challenges identified above while contributing to one of USAID Haiti's development objectives: DO2: Economic and Food Security Advanced. The project's Results Framework outlines the expected outcomes and indicators for each objective, including the establishment of a network of Haitian business advisory and workforce development service providers, the training of business development service providers on providing gender-aware business advisory and workforce development services, and the development of client-centric financial products and services for MSMEs by financial service providers. Overall, the ATTEINDRE project aims to provide targeted support for MSMEs in Haiti to become bankable enterprises, enabling them to grow, become more competitive, and generate jobs, and contributing to increased household resilience and more inclusive economic growth.