Saving Programs and Poverty Reduction amongst Vulnerable Families Living with HIV/AIDS in Kayonza District Rwanda

The purpose of the study was to establish the extent to which saving programs contributes to poverty reduction of vulnerable families living with HIV/AIDS in Kayonza District. This has had a lot of impact in the household level by improving their livelihoods, education access etc. However, many households are still facing with various sustainability challenges, which if not addressed could affect the life of the family members in the long-term. Descriptive research design was used to collect quantitative data from a target population of 110 members of VSLAs from SOS in Rwanda. A sample size of 87 respondents, and 2 TOTs within SOS village in Kayonza. Data collection was done using questionnaires which were administered to the respondents who are members of the village saving and Loan Associations. Content validity was used to establish the appropriateness of the instruments while half-split method was used to establish reliability. Quantitative data from the field was processed using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) Version 21. The analyzed data was presented in the form of frequency TABLES. Majority 37 (46.3%) indicated that there were group members going out with multiple sexual partners for economic gain.11 (13.8%) indicated no knowledge, while 80 (31.4) said they were not sure. This implied that majority of the respondents engaged multiple sexual partners as a way of earning extra income. Majority of the respondents preferred saving through merrygo-round 66 (52.5%) followed by table banking 62 (77.5%) while only 44 (55%) prefer saving through commercial banks. Majority 43 (53.8%) said that they got their income through regular employment, 28 (35%) said that they got their income through income generating activity while nine (11.3%) said that they got their income through Donations from friends and well-wishers. The study concludes that through the saving programs households' income increased and there wasan increase in saving levels. The study recom