Rural Livelihoods Collaborative

Location and Context
The rural communities of New Mexico are vital assets that warrant support. Rural communities constitute an important part of the rich state's rich multi-ethnic"majority-minority" population. (e.g., 41% Hispanics, 9% Native American, 2% African Americans and 1% other, such as Asian-Pacific). Rural communities, often steeped in tradition, still include networks of extended families which individually and collectively succeed in cobbling together creative livelihoods. In adapting to New Mexico's arid and rugged topography, people living close to the land have developed ingenuity, tenacity, and an inventive nature. New Mexico's rural communities, having persisted for decades in the face of economic and environmental change, now face the challenge of not only surviving but utilizing the modern technological and geo-economic changes to sustain and enhance their remote but interdependent livelihood.

New Mexico also faces some serious challenges as one of the poorest per capita income states in the country. Our rural areas are where the pockets of poverty are most severe. Nearly half the Native American and over one quarter of the Hispanic populations are living at or below the poverty level. Eight of the ten New Mexico counties with the highest poverty rates (individual and family) are rural counties with minority-majority populations. The majority of New Mexico's rural counties have been designated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as Persistently Low Income Counties.

Collaborative Structure and Strategy
Focused on identifying and supporting various "rural livelihoods" from native weaving to bison ranching, -which can be developed and sustained through a combination of debt and equity financing and with specifically-tailored technical assistance and peer learning opportunities. NMCF and NMCDLF are now developing strategies for providing new forms of equity support, as well as customized programs of technical assistance and management support to emerging community-based enterprises.

Leverage and Impact
Over the next three years, through the strategic use of substantial "flexible operating grants" and "long- term or patient equity-like loans" along with specialized technical assistance and enhanced peer-learning opportunities, NMCF and NMCDLF expect to better serve rural community-based economic development projects grow to a level of greater effectiveness and provide a sound basis for these projects' long-term sustainability through

1) substantial grants focused on building operational capacity for sustaining economic development enterprises

2) sufficient credit that can be structured as equity-like financing to better

a) meet borrowers needs,
b) allow for positive growth/development and eventually
c) move borrowers into a banking relationship;

3) technical assistance, which is more specialized and intensive, to help community-based economic development projects solve specific problems and build enduring organizational capacities;

4) peer-learning opportunities that produce empowering, and self-sustaining networks of collaborative support.