Today we were off to the Njombe region to visit our locations
there. The Njombe SACCOS are being
funded by the Western Iowa Synod (WIS) of the ELCA. We currently have three locations for WIS and
are opening a fourth. We have been to Njombe
before, but we have not visited all of these locations.
Uhambule is an old congregation. It was started in 1943 by a German
missionary. It was perhaps the first
Lutheran church in this area. The parish
itself has about 1,100 members with 600 or so at the main church. The pastor here is new, having been ordained
about a year ago. He is very interested
in learning about Iringa Hope and our work.
We arrived in Uhambule about 1 PM. We were surprised at how hot it was (about
90). We had
checked the weather forecast
for Njombe and found that the high was supposed to be about 63. We learned that Uhambule is much lower than
the city of Njombe and therefore much hotter.
The main crops here are maize and sunflowers, but they often have spotty
rains and uneven yields. The area today
was very dry and windy. The dust was
blowing and it was hard to see very far.
 |
| The chairman greeted Sandy. We have not been here before but we know the officers from training classes in Iringa. |
The first thing we did was have tea with the officers. The Uhambule SACCOS currently has 61
members. It was just registered and
started making loans with a 1-year term at 2.5% per month. Their members all pay five- months’ worth of
interest “upfront.” This allows them to
make more loans. Tom suggested that they
shorten their lengths to nine or ten months so they have time to collect their
loans, do their book keeping and get ready for their next loan cycle. They thought this might be a good idea.
Last year they borrowed $7,500 from Iringa Hope Joint SACCOS
(IHJS). Putting these funds together
with their own savings, share sales, etc. they made 44 loans for a total of
$13,000. It looks like they will get
100% repayment this year so, after repaying Iringa Hope plus their expenses
their SACCOS should add about $2,800 to their capital. This year more of their members want loans so
they are hoping to borrow $15,000 from the IHJS.
Following chai we went over to the meeting room to talk with
our members.
There were about 34 people at our meeting – a good turnout
for this size membership. They
introduced their board, their officers and committee members. The Village government chair was at the meeting. He is very interested in learning more about
Iringa Hope. Peter greeted the members
on behalf of the Micro Finance Institute (MFI), then one by one we introduced
ourselves. Tom gave a short talk about
how Iringa Hope belongs 100% to its members.
He went on to emphasize that they run their SACCOS and they make
their own decisions. There were a lot of
smiles and proud faces here.
 |
| Today Gideon gave the lesson on agronomy. |
Today Gideon, the MFI’s agronomy intern, gave the
lesson. Venance, our main agronomist,
had to stay in Iringa to have his tooth pulled and needs to take a few days to
recuperate.
As Gideon started his lesson we went next door to talk with Mynesta
Lulenga, the assistant chair.
Mynesta is
37, married and the mother of two. Her
oldest is just starting secondary school and her youngest is in primary
school. Mynesta farms 2 acres of maize. Last year she borrowed $110 to fertilize her
fields. She told us that her fields did
not get much rain this year so she only harvested 15 bags. The prices here in Njombe are much lower than
in Iringa, which, as you may recall are also quite low. She will only get $15 a bag instead of the
$25 in Iringa. Still, there are tariffs
and shipping costs to send her crop to Iringa so it is better to sell it here
than send it elsewhere. She is starting
to sell her crop now, and thinks she may wind up with a profit of $120 or so.
Sandy asked her what the SACCOS meant for her and her
family. She told us that two years ago
she could not plant at all. Before that,
she had only occasional harvests and never made much of a profit. This year the $120 that she has earned will
allow her to send her son to secondary school and pay her youngest son’s
fees.
She went on to tell us that she also thinks that she did not
use enough fertilizer. This is a common problem. People try to save money by using less
fertilizer, not realizing that they lose more in yield than they save in
fertilizer. This coming year she plans
to borrow $150 and use it all on her fields.
She has a great laugh and seems very happy.
Elisha Mbeni was our next volunteer to be interviewed. He is
67 and married, with 7 children and 11 grandchildren. Elisha has 3 children in
college, and he and his wife are helping them with their college fees. Last year he borrowed $450 to farm his 5
acres of maize. He too says that the
rain he had was not good – but he still got 105 bags of maize. He is selling his cop now and thinks he will
have a $1,100 profit when he has paid all of his expenses. He smiles as he tells us that he will be able
to pay for all of his children’s expenses this year. One of his children completed college, so he
will have only two left to pay for.
How has Iringa Hope helped him? He was able to buy all of his ag-inputs ahead
of time, so he had them on hand when the rains came. In a season of little rainfall, being able to
plant at the most favorable time made a big difference in yield.
Elisha thanked us for helping his family. We told him that thanks are due to the people
of the WIS.
When we went back to the meeting, Gideon was just finishing
his class. This is the first time we
have seen Gideon present a class and he seems to connect well with the people
in the class.
 |
| Before we left everyone went outside for a picture. |
We had lunch at the pastor’s house, then loaded up the car and
went to our hotel in the town of Njombe.
Although there is considerable repetition at each village visit, every visit seems to have some interesting experiences/aspects! The gift of empowerment is evident in this report. Keep up the good work.
ReplyDelete