About WCCN
Founded in 1984, the Wisconsin Coordinating Council on Nicaragua (WCCN) is an independent, nation-wide, non-profit, membership-supported organization based in Madison, Wisconsin.
Mission
The Wisconsin Coordinating Council on Nicaragua (WCCN) fights poverty by partnering with Nicaraguans to build sustainable economic alternatives for the working poor. Utilizing the powerful tool of microcredit, WCCN provides low-income Nicaraguan entrepreneurs and small farmers access to financing so they can grow their operations and work their way out of poverty. WCCN also promotes fair trade, women’s empowerment, and housing improvement initiatives and fosters greater understanding, goodwill, and peace through people-to-people exchanges.
Vision
WCCN envisions a world where access to financial services and economic resources is not the privilege of a few, but instead an opportunity for many. Based on principles of economic and social justice and citizen diplomacy, WCCN’s projects strive to break down barriers of exclusion, thereby empowering Nicaragua’s working poor to actively participate in their own economic decision-making and provide better futures for themselves, their families, and their communities.
What WCCN Does
- Sustainable Development: We work in partnership with socially responsible investors in the United States, and Nicaraguan organizations involved in alternative credit programs with the aim of promoting a sustainable model of financing Nicaraguan families who lack access to other sources of credit. Through the Nicaraguan Credit Alternatives Fund (NICA Fund), WCCN channels investments from socially responsible investors in the United States to those alternative credit organizations in Nicaragua, through loans at affordable interest rates. We also encourage U.S. citizens to support alternative economic projects that enable Nicaraguans to improve their standards of life, such as fair trade coffee.
- Social Justice: We work in solidarity with Nicaraguan individuals and social organizations through the U.S.-Nicaragua Women's Empowerment Project and the Housing and Property Rights Project.
- Public Education: Through WCCN's publications and educational events, we help inform people in the United States about the current social and political situation in Nicaragua and about the historical relationship between our countries.
- Citizen diplomacy: We support the Madison-Managua Sister City relationship and other connections between Nicaraguans and Americans that promote grassroots understanding, goodwill and peace. To build people-to-people connections, WCCN sponsors study tours of Nicaragua, as well as bringing Nicaraguan speakers to the United States.