There is growing evidence, both in Somalia and around the world, that membership in savings groups has significant, positive effects on women’s lives. It is linked with better food security, well-being, social capital, self-esteem, empowerment, and resilience for participants and contributes to building stronger, more resilient communities.
With over 3.5 million displacements in the past two years, mostly women and children, the scale of need in Somalia has significantly outstripped available funding. Furthermore, in a context where shocks are increasingly recurrent and extreme, the conversation among donors and humanitarian and development actors has moved from repeatedly asking “How do we save lives in this emergency” to “What kinds of durable solutions will build the resilience of people, communities, and systems so that when crises strike, they cause less destruction and people can recover faster?”
To date, durable solutions and resilience actors have implemented several pilots and projects to support acute and protracted DACs. However, the marginal costs of many of the most effective models are too high to address the large and rapidly growing scale of displacement. New solutions that can work with existing market dynamics to reach more people at a lower marginal cost are needed to make a sizable dent in the problem.
Developing solutions that enable women to better support themselves and their children requires a deeper understanding of their lives, livelihoods, and networks, and preferably involves their participation. Since the multidimensional impacts of savings groups on women’s lives and financial security are well recognized, a better understanding of the intricacies and nuances of these groups and their members may offer a jumping-off point that durable solutions and resilience actors can leverage to generate further impact, either for existing members or other women DACs.
Deeper insights into the connections between women and their rural origins may yield opportunities not only to build livelihoods and incomes of women DACs in urban areas but also to contribute to rebuilding rural economies that have largely collapsed as a result of the most recent drought.
This report shares the findings from participatory research with women from four NGO-supported self-help groups for internally displaced women in urban Baidoa Town, a hotbed of the recent displacement crisis, and the nearby, newly established Barwaqo resettlement site. It offers an in-depth profile of their lives and their market and rural connections and aims to capture the similarities and diversity of their experiences, perspectives, decision-making processes, and ambitions.
