Las Asusenas Group

Thank you for your loan. It has been disbursed to the Las Asusenas group, consisting of Antonio De La Cruz, Deisy Aquino, Martha Adames Hernandez, Antonio Tejada, Maria Cabral, Petronila Perez Hernandez, Felipa Montano, Daysi Ogando, Alejandro Beriguete Berigu, D'oleo Dane by Esperanza International in Dominican Republic. We are excited to watch this business grow. Over the next 6 months, Esperanza International will be collecting repayments from this entrepreneur and posting progress updates on the Kiva website.

I would like to give you an update about the group microloan you helped to fund last year through the Kiva-Esperanza International partnership. Daysi Ogando is a group coordinator for the Bank of Hope Las Asusenas. The loan you helped fund was Daysi’s fourth loan and now she is working on repaying her sixth loan with Esperanza!

Like many Esperanza associates, Daysi makes a living by selling clothes. She lives in Los Alcarrizos, which is a city about an hour outside the capital Santo Domingo. Unlike some women who choose to purchase their merchandise item by item, Daysi prefers to buy “ropa de paca,” which is essentially a themed large pack of clothes (children’s clothes, women’s clothes, men’s clothes, etc.). One advantage to selling ropa de paca is that individual items can yield high profit margins. However, each pack is a large investment (approximately $100 USD) and so a bad pack can be troublesome. Daysi shared that there are always a few items in every pack that she simply has to give away because they’re not vendible.

Daysi appreciates the freedom and self-sufficiency she experiences as a result of microcredit. Since her children are grown and she lives alone, she does not feel burdensome to those around her because she can financially support herself.

If you would like to keep supporting entrepreneurial Dominicans through Esperanza International, follow this link to see loans that are currently fund raising:

http://www.kiva.org/app.php?page=businesses&partner_id=44&status=fundRaising&sortBy=New+to+Old

On behalf of Daysi, the Bank of Hope Las Asusenas, and the microfinance institute Esperanza International, thank you for providing opportunities to those who need it most.

Anne Cherniss

Esperanza International Summer Fellow ´09