Visiting Bobo- Refugee Turned Business Owner
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Last week, fellow ONE field organizer Kim Smith and I traveled with FORGE to the Meheba Refugee Camp in northern Zambia.
In addition to building the world’s largest library in a refugee camp, schools, a women’s center, and assistance for refugees, FORGE, also has a micro-finance project that works to empower refugees and help with business skills.
Recently, the FORGE Microfinance Institute helped invest in agricultural loans to select farming refugees and provided much needed and expensive fertilizer for corn crops. Already is has proven to be a huge success as the farmers that received the fertilizer loan are having record corn growth.
We also paid a visit to another loan recipient, Bobo, a refugee turned baker. The first day we stopped in at his bakery, Bobo was not there and we were told that he closed his shop to travel around and stock up on corn and flour. The next day we returned and we spoke with him about his business.
Originally Bobo received a small loan to start his business. He did very well and when his rent went up in the market, he applied for another loan to build his own free standing bakery that allowed him to be profitable, pay back his loans, and provide for his wife and daughter. When we asked about the global food crisis and rising prices, Bobo took out all of his receipts and showed us the dramatic increase in the price of corn and flour. Being a successful baker and businessman, Bobo was fortunate enough to be able to stock up on his ingredients as prices continue to rise.
-Matthew Bartlett, ONE Field Organizer
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May 29, 2008 at 4:35 pm
All I can say is – Thank You, Matt, for this inspiring story from Zambia. While I am always heartened by these success stories, there is a part of me that remembers that stories like Bobo’s is more an exception than the rule in much of Africa.
Not because African people can not achieve, but because the ravages of civil conflicts, climate change and extreme poverty (which has historically been implemented by the richer nations on African countries and continues to be to this day) are not providing African people with the opportunities to achieve for themselves and the ability to have decent standards of living.
This is ONE reason why program like PEPFAR are ESSENTIAL TO AFRICA’S FUTURE. Without them, the little bit of hope and rope which has been given to millions of African People as a matter of JUSTICE will be unceremoniously latched away from them to leave them to fend for themselves in a raging river of social injustice – and many of them won’t be able to survive.
A very sad truth to which I am personally committed to stopping. I hope everyONE else is also.
ONE HEART, ONE HOPE, ONE VOICE, ONE LOVE – debbie
http://www.mpwn-uganda.org
May 30, 2008 at 11:05 pm
Great stuff! I’ve sponsored some microloans via Kiva.org, also a great program.
May 30, 2008 at 11:12 pm
Wow, what a great story and what a cool kid. He will obviously become someone one day.
JJ
http://www.Privacy-center.net
May 30, 2008 at 11:20 pm
I personally recommend to those interested in helping Bobo and others like him start their own business to micro-lend. You can do this through Kiva very easily ( http://www.kiva.org ).
Kiva uses PayPal and allows you to loan $25 or more to your preferred entrepreneur like Bobo. The loan has no interest (so you don’t make any monetary profit) and allows people like Bobo to invest and help their communities without using loan sharks or banks who charge interest.
The loans are normally collected and returned to you in full after 4-12months and you can then reloan your sum to another entrepreneur and have another chance at helping progress another impoverished community’s welfare.
I currently loan like this using any idle money in my PayPal account, I prefer to loan to well deserving people than letting my money sit idle and used by PayPal to profit on my behalf.
Check http://www.kiva.org/about/how and http://www.kiva.org/lender/zeeshan to see what I mean
May 30, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Thanks Matt for this great story. It’s amazing to see how people lives are changed through the kindness of others. We all need to give more and improve the lives of others.
May 31, 2008 at 7:30 am
If people are interested in microfinance loans as a micro-way to help lift individual people out of extreme poverty, I do hope that ONE Blog readers don’t forget about ONE partner member, The Grameen Bank (Foundation) – headed by Nobel Peace Prize winner Prof. Mohammed Yunus.
They have been providing micro-finance loans to some of the world’s poorest people for nearly thirty years.
Micro-finance loans are fine but they are NOT going to be helpful to countries when their people are dying exponentially from HIV/AIDS & extreme poverty.
So I hope all my fellow posters are just as excited about & motivated to support the re-authorization of PEPFAR so that the people that they want to support with micro-finance loans are STILL ALIVE to receive their assistance.
Think about it.
All the Best, debbie
http://www.mpwn-uganda.org
May 31, 2008 at 12:13 pm
if you took the quality of life (wealth, health, education, infrastructure, etc) of the “rich nations” and gave it to africans, and traded their quality of life with the “rich nations,” i believe, over time, things will go back to the way we are right now.
i believe it has more to do with the culture in the countries than it has to with the “oppression” of the “rich nations.” believe me, i’m not saying this as a racist comment. it does not have to do with the color of their skin, just that their social environment does not make for good commerce, or mal-adjusted neighbors.
if you want to see real change, you need to instill good habits, not just throw money and resources. especially if they take those money and resources and use them to fund bad habits.
May 31, 2008 at 8:37 pm
yes, rich-fat, thank you for you completely ludicrous and unsupported…”hypothesis”..
July 1, 2008 at 3:15 pm
I know this is way after the fact, but rich-fat, you should check out the book “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid” by C.K. Prahalad. It deconstructs the ideas surrounding poverty that those at the bottom lack the skills and abilities to raise their social and/or economic status, as well as addressing your concerns about “good habits” among the poor. Maybe check it out. You might find it interesting.
As another sidenote, there are countless examples of instances where resources are “thrown” at the poor and end up being all the wrong resources. It can be argued that uninformed activism produces as equally bad results as “bad habits.” In contrast to uninformed activism, microcredit programs are informed about the people they are lending to and consequentially their program success rates are huge.
It’s possible to cultivate that “social environment” that creates good commerce. The talent is there; it’s a process of giving that talent avenues to produce a better quality of life for the individual.
August 3, 2008 at 1:47 pm
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December 24, 2008 at 11:35 pm
Excellent site. Good work.
July 7, 2009 at 1:14 pm
Great article! In addition to Kiva, microplace, optinnow, etc.. take a look at unitedprosperity.org, it’s a relatively new start up with more of a focus on India.