By Louise and the Dream Team | Director
Greetings! Thank you for being who you are and supporting us, you are making a huge difference through your gift to the lives of children and families.
I was speaking to my dad last week, who like you is a supporter! He and my mum used to live and work on the railways in Nigeria in the 1950’s. Anyway dad suggested that I need to explain more about the subsistence economy of South Africa.
When I speak about the amazing amount of money that people have been able to save through the Self Help Group (SHG) project. But I want to help you understand why you need to continue to support this program and the Children’s Project.
Although we have 80 SHG with approximately 1400 ladies in the groups, the groups of have saved R 1,569,872.00 Dad asked if the ladies took loans of R1,000 how did they pay back the load plus interest? Well, 70% of the ladies now have small businesses, like Christina from the previous week’s report with her hiring off cooking pots. But what about other ladies. Well I want to share about that now.
The ladies start off very small, with very small loans for example R10 (is equal to approximately $50c USD or €0.50 and they buy a packet of 20 cigarettes. Then they sell each cigarette individually for R1. Making R20 or a profit of R9 after paying 10% interest on the initial R10 loan. Then they take the profit and reinvest for another packet of cigarettes, this time the profit is all theirs, and none gets returned to the SHG. And so the money grows. Slowly, painfully slowly, that is why it is such an achievement to these ladies to be able to take loans now in the R1,000’s for their business and earning a small living.
The lady pictured has what they call a small “Spaza”. It saves people travelling to town to get bits and pieces because that costs taxi fare. She sells matches by the half box or even to light up the cigarette that she sells one by one. In the 2L coke bottles she has detergent that she sells at R20. She also sells oranges at 10cents each. In the little containers on the left of the photo are pots of Archa, local delicacy of green mango with spices which accompanies bread or pap (a maize corn staple). These sell for R5 a pot. The vegetables also add to her offering to her community.
This lady has the start of a nice house, but her husband, who was the bread winner died. She is too young for a pension. She has no means of support as there are no grants for the unemployed. So she lives in a nice house with no roof or windows, just a room out the back with a roof and door. She has no way of finishing off the house unless she does it herself. It is very hand to mouth, but the ladies make it work and build on what they can offer as their clientele grows.
What is really frustrating is that shops open up in the villages and offer food and goods on time payment, which means people who don’t have the cash today, can still purchase, and at wholesale prices. This undermines local spaza’s, the money goes out of the village, as opposed to the spaza’s which is reinvested in the village. Often now we are finding wealthy foreign nationals with money coming to the villages and putting smaller local businesses out of business. This is affecting the informal economy hugely.
However, the ladies are creative and people always have to eat and clean. SHGA has given them hope, they are not waiting around for the solution, they are becoming their own solution. They are taking charge at family and village level. This is community development at its best.
Now with the Cluster Level Associations developing and influencing communities through advocating for change, this is reinforcing the development we are seeing. This is what your support is doing, it is bringing hope to the otherwise hopeless. The children are benefiting within the families, they are receiving nutritional food, they are going to school in uniform, like all the other children, they are able to concentrate in class and achieve learning outcomes, we are linking the SHG children with Scouts so that they are developing holistically. A win x win through the integration of the programs.
That is where you come in. We are not fully funded for either program. You supply the much needed difference. You are a part of their success. Thank you is not a strong enough word to convey how much you mean to us. It is just beyond a simple thank you. Please don’t ever think you are not doing enough, or how can my few dollars make a difference, it does, and you do! You are our partner, you are our friend, and you are helping to bring hope to people who didn’t have any hope. Together we are changing lives exponentially.
Thank you
Blessings
Louise
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