What do women do with their loans from WINHEEDCAM?

Have you ever wondered how African women use the loans in a microcredit program?  The WINHEEDCAM Coordinator recently asked this question of some of the women who had been in the program for a number of cycles and thus were eligible for “larger” loans ($300 to $600).   In their own words:

I am a member of the SHA Women’s group, and a trader in different products.  I took 150,000 francs (approximately $333) from which I bought 2 bags of corn to brew corn beer.  I bought firewood and paid labor to split it ready to sell, and I bought a bale of second-hand ladies’ bags.  All these are bought wholesale, and [when I sell] the different goods I make profits.  I use the profits to pay my loan, and part to run my home, pay [school] fees for my children, and buy medication for any sick person in my home.  I am really happy with the program because I have started building up my own capital by saving some of the profit.  I wish that they would increase the [loan] amount since I sell many items and buy raw materials in bulk.

I am a “buyam sellam” as we are fondly called.  That is I buy food items like corn, beans, groundnuts (peanuts) from distant markets and sell in the central (local) market.  I took 300,000 francs (approximately $666) but I would love to have taken 500,000 francs in order to buy a bigger stock.  But from the profit I am making, I will gradually build up my own capital.  I am so grateful to the initiators of this program.  May God richly bless them.

I took 200,000 francs (approximately $444).  I am “buyam sellam” of cocoyam, beans, plantain.  I sponsor my children in school. I have requested another 200,000 francs but if I had an opportunity to take more I would have been very happy. 

Reality check:  While many women are able to make use of large loans, even these successful women may have emergencies that make loan repayment difficult.  Two of the women who were interviewed reported having to spend some of their loan money for sick children.  Another had traveled to the capital to buy ready-made dresses to resell, but the bag of dresses was lost or stolen as she was returning to her village.  Yet another reported mistakenly giving wrong drugs to the piglets she was raising with her loan money, and they all died.  Stories like these are both personal tragedies and institutional challenges for a microcredit program.

Update on WINHEEDCAM plans and activities in 2007

WINHEEDCAM has a number of objectives for 2007.  One of the most important is to increase membership by 200 women each quarter, as well as increasing women’s savings and the number of loans disbursed.  The Coordinator also notes that activities will be concentrated and consolidated in the present areas of operation, in order to have a greater impact on the women members.  Training will focus primarily on the field agents and on the women’s groups themselves, although staff will need additional in-depth training in the new Loan Performance software program. Finally WINHEEDCAM hopes to put greater emphasis on networking with other microfinance organizations, both nationally and internationally.

Major activities of the first quarter included field agent planning meetings in both sections (Bamenda and Banso), and continuous training of women’s groups emphasizing the need for savings.  The Coordinator also benefited from a three day Leadership workshop on Coaching and Mentoring for Managers and Coordinators of the Cameroon Baptist Convention.

Fourteen new groups totaling 162 women joined the program in this first quarter.  A total of 77,440,000 francs CFA was disbursed to 851 women.  The average loan size for the total portfolio is growing as women continue to repay and take larger loans. It is now about $182, compared to $171 in the fourth quarter of 2006.

News from the Women’s Support Group and Chosen Children programs

The national president of the Women’s Support Groups for Cameroon is a local woman living with AIDS in the Bamenda area.  She was instrumental in recently organizing regional meetings of Women’s Support Group members in four towns throughout Cameroon, with more than 150 women participating at each site.  Over 100 of the women members in the local Women’s Support Group who receive loans from WINHEEDCAM attended the Bamenda meeting.  As reported in the Cameroon Baptist Convention newsletter, “two members from Bamenda gave moving testimonies on how the Support Group is helping them to live meaningful lives,” and they appealed to other women to defy the stigma of HIV/AIDS and join them.

Currently 201 women in 15 support groups have loans through WINHEEDCAM.  Another 182 have pending loan requests.  WINHEEDCAM is also supporting 1374 “Chosen Children”, whose parents have died of AIDS, by providing loans to caregivers of these children.  The need is tremendous and growing.  It would take approximately $80,000 to fulfill all the loan requests from the Women’s Support Groups and the Chosen Children caregivers.

Ten Years on the KWIHEED Board: Never Boring!
      Sarah Richards, Chair of the KWIHEED Board

The KWIHEED annual BOD meeting that was held in mid-May marked my tenth year on the board. I certainly don’t remember every meeting, but as I think back over the past decade, there are many good memories of our work. In 1996 I was invited by Munro Proctor and Pius Tih (who I’d known from Boston University School of Public Health) to serve on the board as one of three anthropologists familiar with North West Province, Cameroon and its people. Communications between KWIHEED BOD members (as we are spread across the US) and between KWIHEED and WINHEEDCAM BOD and staff have always been fraught with difficulty, but have improved over time, with the proliferation of email and mobile phone networks. Telephone calls in the early days tended to be more ‘miss’ than ‘hit’, especially during the rainy season—and the poor connections meant that conversations consisted of shouting phrases back and forth. Just last year, the WINHEEDCAM office got internet access installed, making communications much less expensive than going to an internet café. What a difference it has made!

KWIHEED and WINHEEDCAM started out very small, but grew rapidly, as news of access to low-interest credit for rural women spread by word-of-mouth and reputation. As the staff of WINHEEDCAM grew in response, we in KWIHEED soon realized that expertise in the area of micro-finance was needed beyond our capacity to self-educate, and the membership of the board expanded and evolved in response to this need. Several members, including myself, also had the opportunity to travel to Cameroon to work with WINHEEDCAM staff, meet with their BOD, and most importantly, visit with borrowers. During these visits we witnessed the drive, dedication and entrepreneurial skills that are impossible to express through financial reports—that is why the KWIHEED newsletter always includes photos and stories of the borrowers themselves. More than money, donations to KWIHEED have given borrowers opportunities to realize their potential as businesswomen. Although the program has grown and changed quite a bit over these ten years, the fundamental aspect of access to low interest loans and training in business development for women has been constant. What a difference it has made!

Donations now possible from the website,  www.kwiheed.org

Thanks to the efforts of John Blackford, a KWIHEED board member, and our webmaster Lorraine Ellis, on-line donations can now be made quickly and securely from our website.

KWIHEED’s Major Needs in 2007

• $50,000 for 1,000 new loans
• $80,000 to support Women’s Support Groups and Chosen Children  

Donations:  Payable to “Kwiheed”   c/o Mary-Susan Leahy, JD  Orr & Reno, P.A. PO Box 3550 Concord , NH 03302 -3550

Questions?    Mumro H. Proctor, MD, MPH Mhproc@aol.com