How the ILO supported SSE initiatives in Lebanon with local community leaders

Amid overlapping economic and political crises, the programme team in Lebanon engaged at the community level in Akkar, Bekaa and North Lebanon to launch social solidarity economic initiatives by rallying local community leaders to support their development and implementation. Local leaders were formed into SSE steering committees, featuring representatives from community-based organizations, cooperatives and municipal governments. The SSE steering committees underwent capacity-building to enable them to advise on SSE initiatives and navigate the challenges in the start-up phase. The initiatives themselves were developed in response to challenges identified through community-level assessments in the agriculture sector. These challenges related to the production process, limited value addition and market access. Selected initiatives were provided with training and seed funding, as well as ongoing guidance and mentorship from the steering committees. 

As an example, one SSE initiative was developed in response to the high cost of greenhouses, which left low-income farmers without space to seed crops in colder months and thus their growing season was shorter. The SSE initiative provided shared greenhouse space to refugee and host community farmers for a small fee and on the condition that a percentage of their produce be made available, free of charge, for members of the community facing food shortages. 

Because the committee members had an established leadership role in the community and were involved in the design and selection of initiatives from the outset, they invested heavily in their development. One marker of success was the signing of an MoU by one steering committee with its municipality, recognizing the committee’s role in mobilizing and guiding SSE initiatives. While the success of the initiatives themselves was challenged by the severe economic downturn in the country, they still made a difference at the community level: as well as the social good that each one supported, they created 39 jobs. 

As well as providing support to get SSE initiatives off the ground, the PROSPECTS team focused on the development of social enterprises (SEs) in sectors with job-creation potential. These sectors included agriculture, of course, but also those impacted by trade disruptions, giving domestic producers a chance to fill gaps due to the non-availability of traditionally imported goods. The team also supported enterprises that employed refugees or served them as customers, given the regulatory barriers faced by refugees in owning and registering their own enterprises in Lebanon. 

The initiative supported 17 SEs in the main refugee-hosting areas with technical training (six months of one-to-one coaching and access to networking events) and grants (of up to US$20,000) to boost their operational capacity and expand their social impact. Despite all this support, however, the financial downturn made it very difficult for them to become established. Many could not achieve financial independence without external support, while others struggled to expand their social impact.  

The experiences in Lebanon demonstrate the enthusiasm at the local level to serve a social purpose and develop businesses. Being able to sustain the initiatives in the longer term and scale up impact, however, remain challenging against the backdrop of financial crisis. Micro loans and savings products might be potential mechanisms to develop business capital, but the volatility of the situation in Lebanon requires careful weighing up of the risk factors that can influence the potential for social impact. 

Read about success stories of cooperatives formed in Lebanon:

• ILO PROSPECTS Lebanon supports social enterprise initiatives in Lebanon