Neighborhood wellness centers
Introduction
The Pro Housing Social Foundation (FPVS) is a non-profit entity that emerged in 1992 by a group of businessmen interested in concepts such as: Social Capital, Community Participation and Mobilizing Event. The main mission of the foundation is to contribute to the solution of the problem of poverty through the improvement of housing and living conditions of the lower-income sectors, the so-called "Base of the Economic Pyramid). FPVS's largest projects are related to the granting of microcredits and the development of infrastructure.
FPVS concentrates its efforts in the province of Buenos Aires of Argentina, [1] in the northwest sector of the second cordon of the Buenos Aires metropolitan area, which includes the districts of: José Clemente Paz, Malvinas Argentinas, Merlo, Moreno and San Miguel.[1].
The approximate area is 643 km², with an approximate population of 1,650,00 inhabitants (2001), of which 64% live below the poverty level of Argentina. This population is characterized by having serious deficits in terms of adequate levels of health and habitability in their homes, urban equipment and infrastructure (sidewalks, pavement, piped storm drains), and adequate recreational spaces as well as little access to public services (gas, water, electricity). While there is high demand for goods and services within these areas, there are generally no companies willing to do business there due to perceived investment risks. In this context, many of these families have difficulty accessing formal credit, making it extremely difficult to improve the quality of life of these sectors of the population.
The Foundation works to organize the discrepancy between supply and demand, maintaining a line of work that privileges individuals as subjects of their own development, using and creating tools for this purpose. FPVS is based on the hypothesis that it is possible to implement a model that allows access to infrastructure services at the Base of the Pyramid through the generation of social capital and new transparent financial models (such as microcredit and trust).[2][3].
Running Programs
Solidarity Microcredit Program
The “Solidarios” program consists of granting microcredits for housing improvements to low-income families that have been excluded from the formal credit market because they are profiled as "high risk." The microcredit is granted to families who request it as a group and who, as such, are joint guarantors of the requested amount. An instrument according to the possibilities of lower-income families and those with informal jobs. Credit is offered in small amounts of short duration with low interest rates. To date, the Solidarios project has granted credit to more than 8,500 families in the northwest area of Greater Buenos Aires to improve their homes.