Third and Fourth repayment meetings, and Education World 86 visit

We have had two more successful repayment meetings with the two ASOLs of Unión Perú and Santa Isabél. At the last one our visitors from the French NGO Education World 86, who arrived on the 2nd of April, attended the meeting to get to know the members of the ASOLs and see how SOLAC’s Microfinance programme is running.

Here are the thoughts of Melinda Tims, EW's secretary:

"Education.world-86, Solac´s sister NGO in France, has provided the venture capital needed to start up 2 microcredit groups in the Huachipa slums outside Lima. The French NGO has also had 3 members working in Peru since early April, working both with the microcredit team and with the local school in the same area ; this experience has provided a first-hand opportunity to see the work in progress. The results have been outstanding.

The Solac microcredit team brings together talent, intelligence, great commitment, and outstanding preliminary results. The first 2 women´s economic self-help groups have completed their business training workshops and are half way through their repayment cycle, and 2 new groups are currently being formed. The ground work for all of this has been carefully thought out and the team has been highly successful in trouble-shooting so as to avoid any pitfalls. This endeavor is an ongoing process, so much obviously remains to be done in this impoverished area in terms of integrated economic development. EW enthusiastically supports all this work in the field and extends its hearty congratulations for all that has been accomplished."

EW Secretariat - Dr. Melinda Tims, University of Tours (France)

End of training sessions with AVSI and planning of new course

On Saturday 10th of April we held the last of the series of eight training sessions on entrepreneurship ogranized in cooperation with the NGO AVSI for the members of the ASOLs of Unión Perú and Santa Isabél. Even though this course has come to an end, the cooperation between SOLAC and AVSI will continue in the form of monthly sessions where a professor hired by AVSI will be visiting the members of the ASOLs to follow up the progress of their micro-businesses and give them advice.

On the other hand, the Microfinance team is now in the planning stages of a new training course which will be offered to the members of the existing ASOLs and to the future members of the new ASOLs that will be formed in May. This training course will be carried out by SOLAC’s loan officers, who will start to be trained to give this course by INCUBA Network (http://www.incubanetwork.com/index.php), an organization which specializes in giving support and training to micro entrepreneurs.

SOLAC decided that it would be best for the members of the ASOLs to be receiving the entrepreneurial training directly from their loan officers – i.e. the Microfinance team – since the latter know them personally and can therefore better serve for their needs.

First Training session on Entrepreneurship - 16.02.10

As planned, the first training session on entrepreneuship took place yesterday afternoon, 16thof February, in Unión Peru’s communal room. AVSI accompanied the teacher who was coming to Alto Perú for the first time and introduced him to the beneficiaries. At the beginning of the class each person was asked to talk briefly about their business, after which the whole class discussed with the teacher the main concepts of entrepreuneuship i.e. What are the main characteristics of an entrepreneur? The class ended with a very interesting activity that aimed at stimulating the participants’ creativity to find new business ideas.
As mentioned before, a few of our beneficiaries told us that they will not be able to make it to the classes as they were at work. They explained that attending the course twice a week would be too difficult for them to arrange but that they would try their best to participate once a week. Due to this lack of availability, only two women from the ASOL Sagrado Corazón de Jesús and four members of Unidos para el Desarrollo attended the meeting. In addition four other people from Unión Perú who are not part of the Microfinance programme but have a small business in the area participated. Consequently, the teacher together with the participants decided to schedule classes only once a week on Tuesdays. SOLAC’s loan officers will have a meeting with their respective ASOLs on Friday to discuss this new alternative with the groups and ensure that all beneficiaries will get the opportunity to participate in the course.

Second repayment meetings - 11.02.10

The second repayment meetings were held last night at both communities. Again repayment went smoothly and the women were happy to attend and chat. We informed them about the course they will be starting on Tuesday which will take place for the members of both groups together. The majority seemed interested in this, although some people have already informed us that they will not be able to attend as they will be at work. This time, different to all others, we held the meeting with “Unidos Para el Desarrollo” outdoors. This turned out to be very nice, as it created a different, more casual relationship between all. Also, we have printed out photos that we have been taking at meetings and brought it to the meeting so that we were able to make a poster all together, which will be put up on the wall of the communal room of the community.

Training sessions starting Tuesday 16th

After a long delay in start, the members of both our ASOLs will be starting a course on entrepreneurship this coming Tuesday. Sessions will be held twice a week (Tuesdays and Thursdays) for two and a half hours each and will last for a month. Unfortunately, we were told by a few of our beneficiaries that they will not be able to make the classes, as they are at work. We are going to try our best to change the hours, so that all can attend. The syllabus, which we have been working on together with the organization which is organizing this course (AVSI), does look very promising - we therefore do expect the members who are available to participate.

New Funding Received

About a week ago we were informed that we will be receiving new funding for your project from the French NGO (Education World 86) which has been supporting us throughout this, as well as past SOLAC projects. Thanks to the 2,000 EUROS that they are sending us, we will be able to open two new ASOLs. We are planning to have our first meetings with them at the beginning of April. This will allow at least another 20 families in the area to benefit from our project.

We thank you very much for your support!

First Reimbursement Meetings: Sagrado Corazón de Jesús and Unidos Para el Desarrollo

Monday afternoon, 11 January 2010, a month after the disbursement of the loans, we had our first reimbursement meetings with both groups, Sagrado Corazón de Jesús and Unidos Para el Desarrollo. Both meetings were very successful, we had only one person missing from each group and everyone (including the two missing - by giving the payment to a co-member) paid back the full installment.

We started off by reading out loud the bylaws they have come up with the previous meetings, regarding the consequences of not attending or coming late to a meeting and of not paying the installment. They have decided these consequences to be fines, i.e. they would pay a few Nuevos Soles into a money safe (to be used for all their savings and fines) we have provided them with, which forms a communal money pot - money to be spent on anything agreed upon mutually at the end of the cycle.

We asked the treasurer, secretary and president of each group to sit behind a table. Each participant was called up one by one to hand over the money to the treasurer, who would count it, sign the persons payment booklet, and who at the end separated the savings from the capital and put the former in the money safe, which is kept by the treasurer (the key stays with the president, to ensure one person cannot misuse the available funds). In addition to taking attendance, the secretary checked the money handed over to the treasurer and filled in a savings table to keep track of the amount going into the money safe. Normally, (s)he would also takes note of any decisions made at the meeting or of any situation which may be out of the ordinary, but there was nothing to note in either of these two meetings.

After having finished the more “formal” part of the meeting, we were able to spend some more time talking to the participants, asking them how they were doing and how things were developing regarding their economic activity.