Change a Girl's Life Through Microentrepreneurship

During the month of March 2016 26 girls underwent a 3 days intensive training, 18 of them receiving a business grant to start or improve on their businesses. This was only possible because of you.

The training focused on bookkeeping, business management and some exercises and games to spur creativity. There were also separate lessons on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Gender Abuse, topics directly connected to their well-being and direct economic development. The main objective of the training was that each girl should produce a business plan presenting her idea, from which we evaluated if the person was ready to receive financial support.

A disbursement ceremony with presence from relevant community members and family was held one week after. Each of the girls did a speech presenting herself and her plans. Some revealed themselves as very good speech makers, bringing up laughter and applause. They took the opportunity to start advertising their business, or to commend the rest to be responsible and work together to make Tole a place to be proud of.

To make the ceremony more entertaining and educative we showed “Belleh” a short Cameroonian comedy on gender inequality (it depicts a man who suddenly wakes up on a world with gender roles reversed). The producers of the movie graciously donated a copy to the program and we want to thank them again. You can check out their facebook page https://www.facebook.com/belehthemovie and trailer (https://vimeo.com/77741704), it’s really worth seeing! You will get a good insight on the communities you are helping.

At the end each selected girl received 30,000 francs (50$), they are expected to receive another 50,000 (83$) in three months if their first steps are satisfactory. 30,000 are enough to start up a humble business in Cameroon, but it's the 50,000, after getting more experience and testing what works and what not, that will be a complete life changer for them. To guide them during these first months, we have already been supporting them technically in their business places and houses. You will get to know more about that in our next report.

Do you want to know a bit more about the people you supported? We included a section in the business plan to set up goals for the future. These are some of those goals:

“6 months: I will be selling to small suppliers” Esther, 29

“After 4 months I will create a provisions store and later add a fridge and I will have cold drinks and yogurt” Hermine, 22

“I will help other’s become like me“ “I want to be going to other countries to buy and supply here” “I want to create something that is different, something that no one else is having in Tole” Carine, 20,

“In 6 months I will be employing somebody” Itoe, 25

“I will be able to help others in need” Nicoline, 18

We have also inaugurated series in our Facebook Page (www.facebook.com/reachoutcameroon), “Entrepreneurial Women” every Wednesday we will bring you their stories so you can put a face to the persons you helped and know how much impact you are having in so many lives. This Wednesday we started with Bianca, a young girl starting to make his way as an entrepreneur who has a very clear goal: She wants to go to University.

Thank you very much for being there for them, you have changed 18 lives forever, and there are more to come.

P.D: Last thing! We are now fundraising to create Boys & Girls Clubs! https://www.globalgiving.org/microprojects/teen-haven-adolescent-empowerment-in-cameroon/ . We want to educate and capacitate the next generation, stopping them from committing the mistakes of the past and breaking the cycle of poverty. There is less than 60 days to support this project and small donations are really really welcome, just one or two more will catapult its visibility and it will rank among the most popular projects in GlobalGiving.

Thank you again!

Links:

• trailer beleh
• follow us on facebook
• Support Girls & Boys clubs for 80 teenagers in Tole