Foundation Phase (1978-1984)

ASA was founded in 1978 with the aim of helping the poor organize & empower themselves so that they might establish their political and social rights for a just society.

At that time ASA deliberately avoided lending arguing that loans would distract the rural poor from their fight for a just society. ASA defended the idea that political and social reform were needed before credit.

Activists, like ASA's President Md. Shafiqual Haque Choudhury, who were already working for NGOs founded ASA with assistance of like minded development practitioners. They were dissatisfied with the approach of the then NGOs and wanted a more radical, people-centered approach. They decided to create an alternative by establishing a new NGO - ASA.

ASA received formal registration from the government in 1979. To reach its goal of empowering the poor, ASA stressed the need for building people’s organizations, or groups, through mobilizing landless rural poor. Different programs were undertaken including:

• awareness building for social action
• legal aid and awareness build-up program
• training program
• communication support service program
• training for rural journalists

During this time, the group members of ASA conducted a series of social actions to fight against social injustices, gain their rightful access to institutional / public resources, obtain just wages, enter into the local power structure and have access to land.

Although the general impact of the foundation phase was positive, the programs suffered from substantial limitations:

• group members were not able to get a just wage for a long time since the local elite recruited low wage laborers from outside
• impact of natural disaster and the huge inflows of aid obstructed the implementation of the social action programs, since the people began to prefer the economic way of solving their problems rather than through conflict
• idea of apex organizations, built up from and representing groups of the poor, was not sustainable. Being poor, members entered these bodies with the intention of having more facilities and fulfilling their self-interest

In the light of these limitations, ASA adopted a revised approach to make the development efforts more effective.

Reformative Phase (1985-1991)

Since a demand for programs of economic activities was rising, ASA decided to introduce an integrated approach, which included social plus income generation. But although the new approach gave special emphasis on economic activities, ASA stressed the importance of social development aspects. In this phase, empowerment was made through the improvement of health, nutrition, education, sanitation and by credit available to poor. The focus was shifted to women, who play an important role in the field of development.

Again, the reformative phase brought out positive changes in the livelihood of the rural poor, but some constraints were also identified:

• many ASA members left the organization to join other organizations, which provided more appropriate products for their needs of credit for income generation purposes
• development and implementation of integrated programs took a long time and the group members had a long waiting period to obtain credit
• the absence of funds led to uneven distribution, which meant that a few members could obtain large amounts of credit while others got nothing

As many ASA group members left ASA to join other NGOs who were providing credit for income generation, ASA decided to specialize itself in microfinance activities.

Program Specialization Phase (1992- till date)

The main reason for specialization was for ASA to reorient itself to cater to the needs of its members in an effective way. This took the form of providing credit plus programs that eventually led to ASA providing a full microfinance package.

The main elements of ASA approach are:

• savings and credit for income generation in a cost-effective manner
• Member Security Fund (Mini Life Insurance) to shield member from unforeseen hardship

The main objectives of this phase are :

• to alleviate poverty and improve the quality of life of the landless and the assetless rural poor by providing them with appropriate and affordable financial services
• reduce the dependence of the poor on the local moneylenders
• facilitate additional income earning at micro level for improving the economic status of the women
• empower the landless and disadvantaged people

In 2001, ASA became financially self-sufficient and does not accept any grants or donations from outside sources since then.