Today we had two main areas of focus-microenterprises and
supporting economic development and whole child education. We were spending most of the day at Pastor
Francis’ school and we learned the meaning of the phrase “TIA” (This is Africa)
when we learned late the night before that Pastor Francis wouldn’t be there
because he was in Rwanda.
This was actually not a huge problem since Jessi, Michael,
and I had been there for a week and had a good understanding of all of the
projects so we were able to help lead the group. We made a quick stop at
George’s yogurt shop so the other participants could see one of the more
successful microenterprises that Pastor Francis has assisted. We then walked to the school for a quick
introduction and tour before the students had their break. Once on break, everyone spent time playing
and talking with the kids who are so personable and loving they can’t be
resisted!
At eleven o’clock we began our microenterprise work. We asked all of the microgrant applicants to
come and speak about their requests. We
had about twenty applicants and so divided into two groups with each of our
participant groups hearing from about ten applicants. It was so fun to share some of the stories we
had been hearing all week with the rest of our group.
Here are just a few of the stories we heard:
George owns a yogurt shop.
He started as a small business out of Pastor Francis’ house. He now has a shop on the main road and sells
yogurt, juices and bagged water. He owns
a plastic sealer, which allows him to seal the plastic bags containing all of
his products and he sells to individual customers and also supplies some
grocery stores. When the sealer
overheats he has to stop work for two hours while it cools down so he was
asking for a new sealer (250,000 shillings or $83) so he could alternate the use
of them. He also asked for a label maker
(150,000 shillings or $50) as he is interested in making his own label and
developing his own brand of yogurt.
Zemu is a single mom of three. She has been raising chickens for eight years
and teaching her children how do it as well.
She requested about $120 for 30 more chickens, feed, and some cement so
she can construct a building to hold her chickens.
James owns a millet grinding business. He has been successful but would like to
purchase some large bags of millet (300,000 shillings or $100) so he can get
ahead on his profits and reinvest them in his business. He also requested some seeds so he can grow
more millet and generate more profits in the future. In the long term he’d like to develop better
marketing and branding for his business and expand to more wholesale customers.
Celestina is a single mother of two who has advanced
HIV. She has been selling small food
items and charcoal in a roadside shop for the past seven years. She requested about $100 worth of items for
her shop ranging from charcoal to fish to cooking oil to bananas and
spices. These funds would help her
develop and expand her business.
Charles is a carpenter by trade but an artist at heart. He went to three years of art school and then
determined he must make functional art in order to make money. He does beautiful wood carved furniture as
well as some sculpture projects. Charles
doesn’t have employees but rather hires secondary students from local schools
on the weekends in order to teach them the skills of the trade. Charles requested 600,000 shillings for a
heavy duty router so his work will be more consistent quality and faster as
currently they are using a hand chisel.
Helen is a single mother of six whose husband rarely comes
home. For the past year she has been traveling to the market once a week and
buying clothes and then selling them door to door in her neighborhood. Helen requested 200,000 shillings worth of
clothes (about $70) in order to help get her business gaining more profits and
so she would not have to travel to the market and pay transportation for a few
weeks.
Fred is currently a cook at a school but his dream is to
become a farmer. He has moved back to
his village and built a pen for pigs and a coop for chickens himself to save on
expenses. He has seven pigs already and
requested 150,000 shillings ($50) to buy three more so he can begin breeding
them in a few months. Once he makes
enough money he’d like to buy up to 300 chickens and use that money to expand
his business, feed his family, and pay his children’s school fees.
Margaret is a widow with five children. Her meat shop has been open five years where
she sells pork and other food items. She
is currently renting a food stand and she would like to open her own shop. She requested about $100 worth of products
for her shop. She hopes to earn enough
money to acquire her own shop and pay school fees for her children.
Each person was given a few minutes to talk about their
business and then our group members asked some questions. We had some new applicants that required
translations so our process took quite a bit longer than we had been expecting.
We worked until lunch and then headed off to the Sugar
Corporation complex where we had an amazing Indian lunch and also toured the
golf course. The flowers were amazing. After lunch, we were back to Canaan School
for a presentation on child psychology in Uganda and then we wrapped up the
microenterprises. It was a busy day!
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