Why is it called Loop?
“Basically the idea came from the fact that entrepreneurs enter one end and finishes at the other end after going through a series of winding processes or procedures that we thought are not linear.”
Alphonso Campbell
The history of the Loop
The SME Loop was developed in 2014 in Sierra Leone after thoughtful reflections by the two GIZ advisors1 of the GIZ-supported programme “Youth employment promotion through agricultural development (EPP)“.
In 2015, the approach was transferred to Benin within the context of the Special Initiative “ONE WORLD – No Hunger”and its programme “Green Innovation Centres for the Agriculture and Food Sector (GIAE)”. Here, the SME Loop is applied at a scale with more than 1.500 SMEs in 17 communities finishing the SME Loop successfully. Since the early success in implementation and promising results in Benin and Sierra Leone, the rollout of the SME Loop accelerated and implementation succeeded in Burkina Faso, Ghana, Malawi, Mali, Nigeria and Togo.
International SME Loop Association e.V. 