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Posts Tagged ‘Farmers to Markets’

Road Trip: Stories from the Repayment Team

Leaders of the Farmers to Markets program have been working on ways of teaching the farmers that their loans have to be repaid. Unlike other microfinance recipients, such as micro-business owners in urban areas, many of the subsistence farmers who are at the core of FTM have little sense of the importance of repayment. So a team of FTM staff took the Land Cruiser and drove around to associations and homes of individual members. Here are three stories from that experience, sent to us by our Congo Country Manager, Texa Dembele. I’ve included the comments he added to each story.

Story 1. The man who is the first adviser in the APRIBU Association likes the FTM project. Every time we have a visit or activity in the association, he is always the first person to comply. Often he advised the other members to follow project instructions. When we arrived for the repayments, he was the first person who came with money and made a payment. He told the others, “If you get a loan you have to pay! You got this loan easily, you have to pay easily.” One woman took a lesson from his speech. She went into her house, came out, and paid the totality of her loan. The man saw and said, “Oh! How can a woman be first on the list of those who fully repaid their loans?” He returned to his house and brought back 3,500 FC (Congolese francs) ($3.80), the amount remaining due on his loan. They were the first two in their group who fully repaid their loans.

Texa Dembele, at right, with USAID officer Augustin Ngeleka

Texa’s comments: We congratulated the first adviser in the APRIBU Association, and I think he deserves to be first adviser. But you know, the first good example came from a woman. Her example encouraged the man to do more, and he finished paying his loan. We need to focus more of the action through the women, which is also the fifth objective of Farmers to Markets. Also, we need to push the people to pay back their loans. We need to go to them, to their house or the association, like we did on this trip.

Story 2. The FTM repayment team arrived at the ASALO Association. We invited all the members to come and hear why we were there. The chief of the delegation said, “We are here to recover all the payments due on your loans, and we will go house by house.” When one of the women heard that, she said, “No, I would not like you to go to my house. I would be ashamed to see the group at my house asking for the money. Wait for me here.” She went and brought back all the money she owed, 2,800 FC ($3.00), and she paid it. A man who had paid 5,000 FC ($5.43) of the 8,150 FC ($8.90) he owed saw the woman repay her whole loan. He said, “It would be shaming if a woman completed her repayment but no man did that.” He went in his house and brought the rest of the money.

Texa’s comments: We are seeing that the behavior of the women is correcting many men in the associations. When a woman has money to pay back the loan, she doesn’t hesitate. But in the majority of cases, the men hide their money for reasons that we don’t know. It appears that the women have a fear of not repaying the loan. If decisions about how to use money in the households can be made by the women, I think we could make huge progress. As in the first story, the fifth objective of Farmers to Markets is important: “to strengthen the voice of women in the family and commerce.”

Checking on the crops

Story 3. This is told by animator Guillaume Ngombe: When we arrived at the home of one of the Avad Association members, we found the guy and his wife. We said we were there to get his payment on his loan, which he’d had for a long time. The man said he didn’t have any money. I told him, “OK, today we will bring you to the prison. Put on your pants and climb into the car.” (We were in the FTM Land Cruiser.) When the man heard us talk about the jail, he started to cry. His wife told him to take the rooster they kept and give that to us as a payment on the loan. So the guy took the rooster and gave it to the team. The team bought the rooster for our dinner and put the money in the cash box containing repayments.

Texa’s comments: This story showed us that the woman often has the solution to a problem that comes up in the household. The wife of this man found the solution this time. She rescued her family. That’s a good lesson to share in the Associations. It shows, once more, the fifth objective of FTM. Also, the presence of the car in this campaign was a big motivation and fear for all the members of the associations.

SAJ 27 Mar 2013

PCP Supports #GivingTuesday

#GivingTuesday is a campaign to create a national day of giving at the start of the annual holiday season. It celebrates and encourages charitable activities that support nonprofit organizations.

That’s the mission statement for the #GivingTuesday movement. As the name suggests, #GivingTuesday will be observed on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. The idea is simple: We barely have time to give thanks on Thanksgiving before the country launches into a binge of buying — Black Friday, Small-Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday. It’s time to add a day for giving to causes that benefit people who are less fortunate than we are.

We at the Paul Carlson Partnership support that, and we signed on as a partner several weeks ago. Our project on #GivingTuesday is raising funds to give back to the most generous people in the world–who are also the poorest. As you surely know by now, in the Ubangi region of the DR Congo we run Farmers to Markets — a microfinance program for subsistence farmers. All gifts given online (or by designated check) on #GivingTuesday will go for Farmers to Markets, to extend this crucial program that enables the poorest of people to become self-sufficient.

To make it easy for you, here’s a direct link to donate.

#GivingTuesday started out as a good idea shared by some very capable people at a cluster of nonprofits and for-profit corporations. It has rapidly grown to more than 1,500 partners, most of them nonprofits, but also including a healthy mix of for-profit corporations, retailers, and news outlets. See the loop highlighting partners on the #GivingTuesday home page.

A slew of celebrities have also signed on to participate in some way. Yesterday Seth Meyers, of Saturday Night Live fame, tweeted that he will be participating to benefit the organization Cycle4Survival. Others include Charlize Theron, the group Linkin Park, Susan Sarandon, Penelope Cruz, Kevin Bacon, Ryan Reynolds, Cee Lo Green, Mike Farrell, Joe Mantegna, and more.

Will you join us in this movement? Here’s that link again: Give here for Farmers to Markets! Bookmark that so you can come back and give on Tuesday!

And if for some reason you don’t choose to give to PCP (though, heavens, we can’t understand why!), we urge you to give to something. Our partner the Evangelical Covenant Church is also participating in #GivingTuesday, and they’d be a good second choice.

And if not one of those, then please give something on #GivingTuesday, wherever you choose to give. Let’s launch the holiday giving season by together giving a strong boost to those who face harder times than we do.

We have Thanksgiving. We have Black Friday. We have Cyber Monday. And now we have #GivingTuesday!

SAJ 21 Nov 2012

Making a Dent in Poverty: Farmers to Markets

The foundation official was traveling somewhere out west when I caught him on his cell phone. They had funded us before, but he was having a hard time now. “The main donor to our foundation doesn’t want to fund programs in Congo,” he said, with some frustration. “He thinks it’s a waste of money. He says, ‘If you build something, they’ll just come back and knock it down again.’”

Some people write Congo off. “The leaders are corrupt. Half the people are violent and the rest are their victims. The poverty is so deep that nobody’s going to make a dent in it.” You or I could deconstruct those arguments and get angry — or we can prove them wrong.

Texa Dembele and animatrice Patience Kaya in an FTM field

Farmers to Markets, our microfinance program in partnership with USAID, works with 2,200 subsistence farmers, plus 80 bicycle entrepreneurs and 23 wholesalers, in one of the poorest provinces in this poorest country on earth, and through it we are making a dent in the seemingly intractable poverty. Here’s some of the evidence, drawn from a report Byron wrote recently for USAID.

Associations of farmers saw their yields double or triple on demonstration plots in the B season of 2011 by using improved methods of agriculture. In the A season this year they began adopting these methods for their own farms, and they should see a similar increase there.
More small and medium agricultural buyers found plenty of commodities to buy and sell, thanks to our loans. Both farmers and buyers are discovering that it’s possible to make money from agriculture. In fact, other wholesalers, seeing the success of people we’ve funded, have entered the market.
Local prices of agricultural products at the farm level have doubled since the beginning of the project. For example, the price of rice in the Bumba region was $10/sack in the beginning, reached $18/sack late in 2011, and is now at $26. In the beginning corn in Loko was $7/sack and it is now running at $14-$15/sack. Competition works!
Bicycle entrepreneurs who work at buying and selling commodities have moved from poverty (annual incomes of $50 or less) to “middle class” (incomes of $200 or more). In many cases, they have sent all of their children to school, put metal roofs on their house, expanded their retail business, or bought land.
Gender roles are beginning to change. Traditionally, men cleared the fields and women planted, cultivated, and harvested. In the Loko area, most men in FTM have begun helping their wives in the fields. This reflects what the FTM animators teach their associations. They also give women a voice in the meetings, leading some men to give their wives a voice at home as well.
This is a win-win-win system. In the words of one of the larger wholesalers: “The farmers make money, we make money, and people in the cities have more food.”

Sacks of FTM corn in a warehouse

There have been difficulties, of course, including the bad roads, non-navigable rivers, poor communications, and the lack of any bank in the region. There is a long way to go to make life economically sustainable for people in the Ubangi. But we are showing that change is possible, that the people can make their own lives better when they learn new ways. Counting family members, 12,000-15,000 people in the Ubangi are now seeing their lives changed. That’s a dent!

We are continuing Farmers to Markets beyond the term of the USAID funding, which ended on Sept. 30. It will take more time to make the whole program sustainable, and then we want to expand it. If you believe in the people of Congo and like what we’re doing in Farmers to Markets, we invite you to pitch in and help. Your gift will make a difference. You can give securely online here, or send a check marked “FTM” to the Paul Carlson Partnership, 8303 W. Higgins Rd., Chicago, IL 60631. Be a part of this vitally important program that is making a dent in the poverty in Congo!

SAJ 30 Oct 2012

Hard Work Pays Off in Farmers to Markets

Here are some recent news updates from Farmers to Markets, our agricultural microfinance program:

Farmers' Association Molende

There are currently 83 farmers’ associations: 43 at Bumba and 40 at Loko. At Loko, 9 of the associations are composed entirely of women; the rest have both men and women. These associations have a total of 2,546 members, of whom 53% are women.

The associations are now planting community fields, working together, using the new agricultural methods they have learned, and planting good, certified seed that we obtained from the regional INERA office (the National Institute for Agronomic Study and Research). A total of 78 community fields have been planted. As our Congo Country Manager, Texa Dembele, explains, “The Community Fields phase not only strengthens the ties between Association members but also allows the Associations to have money that they can manage according to their need. Also, at the harvest, a portion of the seeds will be set aside for season B.” In addition, association members have planted 1,986 fields of their own.

The “new agricultural methods” that the farmers are learning include planting in rows, spacing the seeds appropriately, and keeping the field weeded. FTM farmers have demonstrated that, using these methods alone, without any fertilizer or special seed, they can increase their crop yields — and their income — by 2 to 3 times.

Certified seeds distributed to the two regions include 5 tons of peanuts, 1.1 tons of corn, and 330 pounds of rice (rice at Bumba only).

A training program titled “Essentially for Women” was presented at Bumba by one of the Loko animatrices, Mme. Patience Kaya. Focusing on how works gets done at home, this module includes an emphasis on husband and wife sharing the work as well as the decision-making about money. Most of the men in the associations led by Mme. Patience at Loko have begun sharing the farm work with their wives.

Bicycle Entrepreneur with His Load

A total of 76 bicycle entrepreneurs are at work in the two regions, 23 of them women. They buy farm products from association members and take them into a town, either to sell to a wholesaler or to market there themselves. Many are developing other kinds of business with their bicycles as well.

There are currently 23 active wholesalers, 11 at Loko and 12 at Bumba. These men and women receive loans of $1,000-$5,000 to buy farm products and take them either to Kinshasa or to another larger city.

In addition, there are 30 “small wholesalers,” who receive loans of up to $100. The Loko office reports that this particular activity has “at least an 80% success rate.” They are planning to give loans to 50 people in the near future. The two regional offices are now considering additional training for both levels of wholesalers, to focus on their critical role in linking FTM farmers with city markets.

One example of a hard-working small wholesaler, from Texa Dembele: “Mr. Nyikoli Jacques does his business by buying crops around Loko and uses his bicycle to sell them at Lisala (a distance of 240 km. [149 mi.]). He makes this trip of 480 km. [298 mi.] with his bicycle. He is in his third operation with a loan of $100. His beautiful story is that with his entry into the Farmers to Markets program, he has been able to pay the school fees for his son, something he was unable to do before. He is very attached to the project and hopes to continue until he can open his own shop.”

SAJ 31 Aug 2012

Farmers to Markets and Food Security in Congo

Fresh evidence that our Farmers to Markets agricultural microfinance program is right on the mark in terms of international priorities. The United Nations Development Programme yesterday released its “African Human Development Report 2012,” and the headline is “Food security must be at centre of Africa’s development.” The report focuses especially on sub-Saharan Africa, where more than one out of four people are undernourished. (Take a look at the six-minute video on YouTube that introduces the report.)

“While acknowledging that there are no quick fixes,” says the press release, “the report argues that food security can be achieved through immediate action in four critical areas.” Those four are increasing agricultural productivity, more effective nutrition, building resilience, and empowerment and social justice.

FTM farmers clearing a field

AllAfrica.com brings the subject home to Congo in an article on its site. “The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has the potential to become sub-Saharan Africa’s breadbasket,” it says, “yet it has the highest estimated prevalence of malnutrition in the world.” What many people don’t know is that the DRC actually exported food up until its independence from Belgium in 1960. Even in 1990 it grew the most cassava of any country in Africa. Now the country has to import food, and many people across Congo are subsistence farmers, like those we work with in Farmers to Markets. In the places where FTM is at work, the average cash income has been about $25 a year.

In this context, Byron called from Congo several days ago with some good news from FTM. In the Loko region, he said, farmers are seeing increases of two to three times the harvest when they use the new methods they’ve learned from our agronomist. In the Bumba region the increases are in the range of one and a half to two times the harvest. And the new methods they’re learning? Plant in rows. Space the seeds out. Weed well. Read more about Farmers to Markets.

SAJ 16 May 2012

Congo Farmers Quadruple Harvest

Elikya Association

Farmers in the Ubangi region can multiply their harvests by up to four times! One of our goals in Farmers to Markets has been to show that this kind of increase is possible for these hard-working people who have been earning, many of them, less than $20 a year from selling their products.

Now we have the evidence that this can be done–and it isn’t really that hard. The evidence comes to us from the Elikya association near Loko. This group, like the 87 other associations in FTM, is made up of about 30 members, roughly half of them women. In the past they have grown food primarily for their families and sold what they had left over. If they could get their loads to market towns. That’s where the FTM wholesalers and bicycle entrepreneurs come in. But back to multiplying the harvest.

FTM leaders encourage every new association to plant a demonstration plot. On one side they use traditional methods and on the other they use new methods they’ve learned from the FTM agronomist. Traditionally farmers have scattered plants around the field, some too close to each other to succeed, sometimes overusing seed. From the agronomist they learned to plant in rows with adequate spacing, use an appropriate number of seeds, and weed well.

The members of the Elikya association followed the instructions and grew the demo plot. And the results? The side using the new methods had produced four times as great a harvest as the other side–even when they used less seed! New methods alone can make that kind of difference, even without certified seed or any other boost.

Congratulations to the members of the Elikya association for such good work, and for showing all of us what can be done. And by the way– the name “Elikya” means “hope.”

SAJ 15 Mar 2012

Power at Loko!

Loko FTM Office with Solar Panels

On Tuesday we received an email from Texa that made us all cheer: the long-delayed solar power system at the Farmers to Markets office in Loko is now working! “The office has permanent electricity now,” reported Texa. “They can work all the time on their computers.”

After the parts were delayed in shipping, they finally arrived several months ago–though not all of them reached Loko. According to the list from the office manager, Pastor Luyada, the missing items included:

All accessories lost or stolen
3 main parts in the connector box stolen
1 battery lost
1 Solar panel received shock (it is working)

It was Molu, the electrician at Karawa, who came to the rescue. As Pastor Luyada tells it, Molu “looked in the old stuff in Karawa and completed some important materials which were lost and stolen.”

In Texa’s words, “It is Molu magic.”

Pastor Luyada concluded his report with this: “All the members of FTM Loko thank the Leader of the FTM Project to give the Loko Office this good possibility. God bless all the PCP Members and all the Donors.”

The system and its design was donated by Kenneth Brill, an energy professional and friend of Byron’s who went to Congo with him in December 2009. The Bumba office is receiving a similar system. Our great thanks go out to Ken–and to Molu as well!

SAJ 6 Oct 2011

Mr. Zabwa Makes Microfinance Work in Congo

One of our Farmers to Markets wholesalers from Loko is Jacques Zabwa. His experience in buying agricultural commodities in the Ubangi, shipping to Kinshasa, and selling them there illustrates the issues, difficulties, and opportunities.

He purchased primarily corn in Loko in December and managed, with considerable difficulty, to get his purchases down to Kinshasa in February. He sold them for $8,000 against his total expenses of $4,500. He bought fuel and other items in Kinshasa and shipped them up to Loko for sale.

Because of this very positive outcome, he hurried back to Loko and bought beans, peanuts, and palm oil and put them on a boat in April. But then misfortune intervened. First the boat was delayed for two months. Then he broke his shoulder. By the time his products arrived in Kinshasa and he could sell them, the prices were very poor. Only the palm oil enabled him to make a small profit.

He tells us that the emphasis in our training on establishing good relationships with both farmers in Loko and buyers in Kinshasa was especially important. Consequently, he is developing a relationship with a buyer in a major company in Kinshasa that enabled him to sell his products on his second trip. This will likely be an important buyer for him in the future. He also points out that he has learned much about shipping on boats, about how products from other regions compete with products from the Ubangi, that market conditions can change greatly in only a few months, and finally that knowledge of business concepts is important and helpful.

BEM 8 Sep 2011

DR Congo #2 in Food Insecurity

Much attention has been focused recently on the famine crisis in the Horn of Africa countries–and rightly so. Somalia has suffered through a drought that exceeds any in the past sixty years. There and in other stricken places in eastern Africa, an estimated 12 million people are in urgent need of food assistance.

But a new report by Maplecroft, a leading company in global risk analysis, puts the DR Congo at number 2 on its food insecurity index, behind only Somalia. In fact, much of sub-Saharan Africa is listed as vulnerable to food insecurity.

The study looked at 196 countries, using 12 indicators to measure forces such as climate, economics, conflict, and other pressures both natural and man-made. In Congo, the continuing violence in the eastern part of the country is a main reason for its crisis ranking on the list. Lack of functioning infrastructure is also listed as a risk factor, and that certainly is a problem in Congo.

Seeing Congo in this light adds a new perspective to what we’re doing in Farmers to Markets. We created that microfinance program as a way to bring cash incomes into the Ubangi region in northwest Congo, and it’s doing that. But in the process, we’re also helping farmers in the fertile Equateur province to grow more food, and developing systems for moving that food into the cities, including Kinshasa. We may end up helping to address food vulnerability as well!

For the full article, see “Somalia, DR Congo top Maplecroft’s food security risk ranking – Horn of Africa food crisis heightened by man-made factors” on the Maplecroft website.

SAJ 7 Sep 2011

Pictures and Comments from Texa

Texa Dembele, our country manager in Congo, just sent a batch of photos that are so good that I want to share some with you. Here are two of them, with Texa’s message. (English is his fourth language. How many of us could match that?)

“I just want you to add to your report some of these pictures. On Byron’s last visit in the Ubangi we were in Bumba and also in Loko. The Byron picture here is showing to our Office Staff that they have to count the cash money on hand on the end of each month. We know that money has to come to Ubangi to help the poor population like the pictures are showing you. These pictures are taken in one of the villages near the Loko Office.

“It shows us that we have much work to do. How will this kind of life be changed if we can not bring development. Farmers to Market works to help the Ubangi population area to be able to produce more, to sell more, to have more to eat, to have more money to rebuild their house, to have money for buying clothes, shoes…

“Friends in US your help will be very import for the Population in Ubangi.

“Thank you for all you’re doing. I am sure God will bless you.”

SAJ