Returnable grants: Reimagining credit for a better normal

The pandemic and its harsh impact on informal workers and macro and nano enterprises inspired the creation of the Returnable Grant (RG).

RG is one where there is no legal obligation to repay; the expectation is only ‘moral’, i.e., the recipient is encouraged to repay when she has achieved some intended milestones of financial recovery.

RGs are designed to fill a specific gap in India’s credit ecosystem for small businesses: dealing with short term emergency situations or external shocks.

Our CEO, Priya Naik and Varad Pande (वरद पाण्डे) from Omidya Network India write about how Revive Alliance is deploying the Returnable Grant to aid recovery and resilience of informal workers and small businesses in the recent edition of Economic Times.

The RG enables funders to benefit 5-7x the number of individuals when compared to a simple grant. Once an RG is repaid, it circulates back into the system to support others with similar needs.

A comprehensive learning and evaluation plan built into the REVIVE platform will provide further data on suitability, behaviours, utilisation and so on.