Micro Loans

The micro-loan program phase of Project Hope is launching this week! Many of you will remember that we started a micro-loan program with a loan group of 20 borrowers a little over a year ago. Those 20 each received a $200 loan, which was repaid over the course of 20 weeks. The group convenanted to pay back their loans as a group and met weekly for training, fellowship and praise. It was a great success and such a huge encouragement for everyone involved to end with 100% repayment of all loans.

Seeing how powerful the micro-loan program was for the ACFI churches, we agreed to make it one of the three focus areas of Project Hope. This week, two loan groups will be launching. One group of 17 borrowers will be in their second round of loans. This time they will each receive $400 to be repaid over the course of 20 weeks. A second group of 31 first time borrowers will each receive $200 loans to be repaid over the same course of time. Please be in prayer for these 48 families.

While it's great to hear that 48 families will be impacted by these loans, what I always enjoy the most is reading over their loan applications and then talking to some of the borrowers when I'm in Liberia. It's a great reminder that each loan is attached to a story of God's grace working its way through the lives of real people.

With that in mind, I thought you might enjoy knowing the names of a few borrowers as well as what their businesses will be. Here they are:

Agatha – Come and Taste Business – selling bread
Beatrix - Mother and Child - selling fish
Eshter - Provision Shop - selling coal
Helena - Helena Cook Shop - selling food
Janneh - I.S. Fish Business - selling fish

There are about 20 questions on the loan application regarding how they will secure customers and supplies and how much supplies will cost as well as how much they will charge for their products. But the ones that really make me stop and think are questions like, "What will be the factors or the things that will make it hard for your business to do well?" How can you work to prevent these? What questions or fears do you have about starting a business?

It's very sobering to read responses about concerns that they might get sick and not be able to carry on the business, or that supply costs will go up so high they won't be able to make a profit, or that someone will steal everything from them. In the US we have so many support systems we don't even pay attention to....insurance, a criminal system based on laws and not bribes, decent medical care, etc. Even if the members of our loan groups work hard faithfully and put into practice what they learn each week, there are still many risks. Thankfully, that's where being part of a group who helps each other and agrees to pitch in when something goes wrong for one of the members is key to the success of the loan group.

I know the folks in the loan groups would really appreciate your prayers. I'll post from time to time how they are doing.