Iemaima Peni

Thank you for your loan. It has been disbursed to Iemaima Peni by South Pacific Business Development (SPBD) in Samoa. We are excited to watch this business grow. Over the 11 months of this loan, South Pacific Business Development (SPBD) will be collecting repayments from this entrepreneur and posting progress updates on the Kiva website.

Dear Lender,

Thank you for lending to an entrepreneur with South Pacific Business Development (SPBD) in Samoa.

My name is Athan Makansi and I am the current Kiva Fellow for SPBD. During the past 10 weeks, I have greatly enjoyed chatting with the Kiva borrowers you have funded, and working with the wonderful staff at SPBD. Meeting all these fantastic people has been a tremendously inspirational experience.

I can tell you that the SPBD workers all work very hard to take care of the borrowers you have funded. All staff work from 8:30 AM until 5:30 PM every day, and some work on Saturdays. They spend all that time making sure women all over Samoa have the privilege of accessing financial services. A privilege that you, in part, make possible through your loans. Some days I work in the office helping the administrators and Kiva Coordinator at SPBD develop new, more efficient ways to post Kiva business profiles and journal entries. Some days I head out into the field to interview borrowers. Meeting the women borrowers in their villages and home settings is always exhilarating. These are my favorite days.

I accompany an SPBD center manager on his or her rounds to collect loan payments. At the designated time, the center manager stops at each village center, where the borrowers from that village are waiting. At these collection centers, I mingle with the women and talk with them about their loan, business, and life in Samoa. Jokingly, the women often ask me if I’m single. My reply of “yes” always evokes a chorus of giggles. Sometimes the group of women surprises me by breaking out in song and dance. Surrounded by such joyous people, I cannot resist the urge to dance too. For a more in-depth view of a center manager’s daily work, view my video and blog post here: http://fellowsblog.kiva.org/2009/07/14/taking-care-of-business/

The structure of SPBD works well with the village system of Samoa. Each village has one center where all the women gather on their designated day to make loan payments. One of the most interesting things about Samoa is the strength of the village system. This affects Kiva borrowers in a few ways. Sometimes the matai, village chief, shows up at the SPBD center meetings to formally greet the loan officers. Often, villages sternly enforce the borrower’s repayments. The strictest chiefs have a rule that if the women don’t pay back their loan, they are fined. A village’s reputation is extremely important. The matai does not want his village’s reputation tarnished by a delinquent borrower. Although this is a harsh rule, it does teach the borrowers good financial stewardship. I’ve noticed in these villages, the meetings run very smoothly, because the loan officers don’t have to chase after irresponsible clients.

Before I came to Samoa, I was most excited about talking to the women borrowers about their lives and stories. After 10 weeks here in Samoa, that is still my favorite part of my job. Every lady graciously shares her story. I feel humble every time. Here are two of my favorite stories from my stay in Samoa.

Like many Samoans, Tumua Senituri learned how to sow crops from her parents, who were farmers. Tumua inherited 3.5 acres of land from her father. But she was never able to use the land at all, because she didn’t have the resources to buy seeds, fertilizer, harvesting equipment, and other supplies. For a long time, the land was unused. Even today, Tumua only uses 2.5 of her 3.5 acres. Tumua has plans to expand her plantation over the next few years to include the last acre. Now that her business is doing well, Tumua hopes to be a role model for the other women by continuing to expand her own plantation. Using her own experience as a successful entrepreneur, Tumua advises the women on their businesses and budgeting skills. See Tumua’s full journal entry here: http://www.kiva.org/app.php?page=businesses&action=about&id=119129.

Tasi Rasch raises and sells cows to other Samoans for weddings, birthdays, and other large celebrations (called falavelaves in Samoan). These celebrations often include an entire village, so an entire cow is cooked to feed the many celebrants. Her loan from SPBD has allowed her to expand her business activities to include a small plantation, which gives her a more stable income. See Tasi’s full journal entry here: http://www.kiva.org/app.php?page=businesses&action=about&id=99924. You can view more pictures of Tasi and other SPBD borrowers on Samoa’s image gallery: http://www.kiva.org/about/imagegallery/#samoa.

On behalf of Kiva and SPBD, thank you again for your continued support of entrepreneurs in Samoa.

SPBD has a new Kiva lending team. Please join the team: http://www.kiva.org/community/viewTeam?team_id=8375.

Cheers from Samoa,

Athan Makansi

Kiva Fellow

Iemaima lives in Lalomanu, one of the most beautiful and popular beaches in Samoa. Thousands of tourists from New Zealand, Australia, Germany and the U.S. fan out on Lalomanu each year to snorkel, swim and tan on its white sands and clear blue waters. Located on the southeast tip of Samoa and facing American Samoa, Lalomanu was the closest village to the earthquake’s epicenter and completely decimated by the tsunami. Iemaima and her family are safe, but her house and plantation are gone.

On the morning the tsunami came, Iemaima was preparing food for her children’s schoolteachers, per Samoan custom. Her husband saw the wave coming, shouted a warning, and together, he and Iemaima gathered their 8 children (ages 2-28) and ran inland, toward the bush located uphill. There they have stayed, because they could not bear to return to their home next to the sea. Using salvaged parts of the tin metal roof from their old house, Iemaima and her husband constructed a temporary shelter. Prior to the tsunami, the plantation was the family’s main source of income. One of Iemaima’s children had a job at a hotel, but the hotel has been wiped out by the tsunami. Now, the family has no income stream. They cannot go into town (Apia, Samoa’s capital) to look for jobs, because it is too far away (an hour by bus.) Iemaima is now focused on looking for materials to rebuild her house. When I ask her how she feels, she says that she is confused, because the shock is overwhelming. Her words are spoken softly in Samoan.

SPBD will be offering Iemaima and other tsunami victims a 1,000 tala loan to rebuild their houses and businesses. If Iemaima chooses to take the loan, it will be posted on Kiva. The Samoan government has also announced plans to rebuild severely damaged houses (more than 75% damaged), replacing them with earthquake and cyclone-proof fales at a cost of 20,000 talas each. Please join SPBD’s lending team on Kiva here: http://www.kiva.org/community/viewTeam?team_id=8375