Asombangni Fru Peter

Thank you for your loan. It has been disbursed to Asombangni Fru Peter by GHAPE in Cameroon. We are excited to watch this business grow. Over the next 24 months, GHAPE will be collecting repayments from this entrepreneur and posting progress updates on the Kiva website.

Asombangni Fru Peter is a founding member of his GHAPE center, and has just received his eighth “Empowerment Credit” loan in May 2008. “I used it well,” he says. With the bulk of the loan – 395,000 of 495,000 CFA – he purchased a new motorbike. The rest of the money went to pay for the registration, the carte gris, and the insurance. He then hired the son of one of his GHAPE group members to drive the bike as a motorbike taxi. “He knows the business; he is already doing well.” Each week, the driver pays Pa Peter 12,500 CFA ($32) of the profit. Declaring the motorbike a success, Pa says, “I promise to pay my loan in 10 months, if possible.”

In the meantime, Pa Peter keeps up the many projects with which he has sustained his family for years since he stopped working as a building technician. “That work was not steady; I was not able to gain enough to keep my family. Agriculture is better.” But he still uses his building skills. Right now, Pa is building a shed to keep chickens. “I want to keep ‘agric-fowls’ (specially bred fowls that must be kept in a shed and grow to full size in just three months). Up until now, he has just kept local fowls (which wander and feed themselves, but take longer to grow).

Pa Peter also raises pigs, grows crops, sells firewood, and taps palm wine – plenty of work for one man, although this has not stopped him from taking a job as a night watchman at a local health center, earning 20,000 CFA per month. “I go to work every night at 7:00 PM and come back at 6:30 AM. Then I go and tap my palm wine, which is best early in the morning. I rest during the day and do my weeding and care for the animals in the afternoon.” His one big pig just “put to bed” a few weeks ago, giving several new piglets, which Pa has already sold. On his farmland, he grows maize, beans, and yams, which are consumed by the family and sold when there is surplus. “Firewood is the best trade,” he says. “I have a eucalyptus forest by my farm and I pay for a machine to go and cut wood every three months.” Each chipper-full yields about 14,000 CFA in profit, but can be more.

Pa is married and the father of six children, after losing two. His wife farms by his side. His eldest son is 32 years old and a metal worker. The second is a businessman, doing trading. His third is a mechanic. The youngest three are still in school, and Pa pays about 100,000 CFA per year in school fees and materials.” Pa is proud to have given each of his children a good start in life. Orphaned at a young age, he had to work to pay his own school fees, and so finished just primary school. “I started with the firewood when I was young, just 12 years old. Then I saved to pay for myself to apprentice with a builder, which cost 140,000 CFA.”

As for the future, Pa says that he has simple hopes. “I want to maintain my home and motivate my children. I want to see them all progress and have a bright future.”

Peter has been with GHAPE for ten years now and is paying back his eighth loan. Between all his various income generating activities, its hard to believe he has time to sleep. He was full of energy and chatty as ever the morning we sat down to discuss his loan history.

His most recent loan was used to buy a motorbike. He was being paid 2,500 CFA ($5 USD) per day by the driver he had hired to drive his bike. After a few months, the driver began to refuse to pay Peter regularly. Peter fired the driver and began looking for a new one; he has not been able to find anyone yet. He has been using the bike for his own personal use, mostly to transport firewood.

Peter has a eucalyptus forest that he planted over 20 years ago now. He purchased the seeds for the trees and planted them on 2 acres of his land. He now has 2 acres full of old and young eucalyptus trees. He cuts, or falls, the trees himself, then calls a technician to cut and chip the trees. He will fall about 12 large trucks worth of wood before calling the technician. The cost to cut this amount of wood is 3,000 CFA ($6 USD) and to chip it is 9,000 CFA ($18 USD). HE then transports his wood (now by motorbike) to the market and can sell one large truck for 2,5000 CFA ($5 USD), a total of 30,000 CFA ($60 USD) for all and a profit of 18,000 CFA ($36 USD).

Peter also rears fowls and pigs. He has 25 fowls right now which he purchased for 1300 CFA ($2.60 USD) each. He raises them for two months before selling; during this time they consume less than one bag of feed costing 13,500 CFA ($27 USD). He will sell them for around 3,000 CFA ($6 USD each), giving him a profit of 29,000 CFA ($58 USD). Peter just sold one of his pigs for 80,000 CFA ($160 USD). He plans to sell his other pigs in 5 months time, before April when the African Swine Fever begins to infect pigs in this area.

Although it is not the season now, Peter also has a pineapple farm. Pineapples can be farmed three times per year, and each time he estimates he can take 100 pineapples from his farm. He can sell his pineapples for around 300 CFA ($0.60 USD) per pineapple. This gives him an added income of 90,000 CFA ($180 USD) per year.

Beyond this extensive list of activities, Peter has a full time job as a night watchman. He works every night from 8:30 PM to 5:30 AM in Bamenda, about a half an hour to 45 minute commute. In one month, he is paid 20,000 CFA ($40 USD). Working for 252 hours a month, he makes 80 CFA ($0.16 USD) per hour.

Peter has 3 children in college now and pays 38,000 CFA ($76 USD) in fees for each per year. He also has 2 grandchildren in primary school that he pays for a total of 5000 CFA ($10 USD). He was only able to stay in school until primary school, so he is very proud to see his children excelling in college. His wife is a farmer and works hr own vegetables and crops for the family to eat and for her to sell.

Since joining GHAPE, Peter has noticed many, many changes. He says "there's changes in education. All my children are educated now and myself. I became educated in administration and business from trainings. And when I was a center chief, I had to learn to listen. Now I can listen, speak, and understand others." He is very grateful for the loan he was given through GHAPE and Kiva and hopes to continue to work hard with his loans in the future.

About GHAPE:

GHAPE clients are required to join groups of five for both support, as well as to cross guarantee one another's loans. Clients also undergo training throughout their time with GHAPE. The first training sessions occurs before a client is given his or her loan; the sessions focus on business management, finance skills, starting an income generating activity, basic health practices, gender mainstreaming, group dynamics and understanding GHAPE policies. The second session of training occurs after a client has successfully repaid their first loan. This session focuses on understanding different possibilities for income generating activities, marketing and management techniques, expansion and growth, profit and loss accounting, and gender issues. Ideas and experiences are exchanged between entrepreneurs, while GHAPE credit assistants offer suggestions and direct the sessions. The following phases of training focus on business and marketing techniques, project cycles, fundraising, financial markets and problems faced and potential solutions.

GHAPE also requires clients to make small payments towards their personal savings. The required minimum for savings is quite small; however, most clients choose to save much more than the minimum requirement. Clients then have access to this savings account in case of any sort emergency. Clients of GHAPE also have access to the revolving "Emergency Fund". Each center has access to 40,000 CFA for this fund; in case of emergency or for health reasons, a client can request a sum from this account. GHAPE allows the clients one month to pay it back with no interest. This fund has helped many clients pay hospital fees and pay school fees when they may not have the savings to do so.

GHAPE tries to instil a sense of community within its centers; upon entering a room, one must say "If we are together," to which all clients reply "We are one." If one of the clients passes away, it is mandatory for all clients in the deceased center to attend the funeral. GHAPE believes that ignorance is one of the key contributors to poverty and attempts to remove this ignorance from all of its clients. This is done through training sessions on business management, health, education, importance of family and gender empowerment, as well as through the bi monthly meetings where clients discuss health, business and family issues with one another. The clients of GHAPE are always very grateful for their loans; however it is the training sessions, center meetings, and group support that allows the clients to invest their loans profitably and improve their living standards. Go to their website now at www.ghape.org