A farmer and his son seeding their peanut field with the use of a horse and a pull-behind seeding machine.
We often call Andando’s method the Whole Village approach, and that’s because the problems our partner communities face are multi-faceted, making it incredibly difficult to solve one need without addressing many others along the way. Our microloan program is one of our oldest and is an integral component of this approach, ensuring that once each community has access to nutrition, education, and healthcare, they also have access to resources for sustained economic growth.
One of our microloan recipients, Tidiane Sakho, with his family outside their home. They used the proceeds from their harvest to make improvements on their home as well as increase their food security.
It’s hard to fully explain the difficulties that Senegalese families face in rural villages. Like families anywhere, they need to put food on the table, pay for clothes, buy school supplies, and cover other household needs. But in rural areas, access to consistent income, banking, and credit is rare. Most families rely on farming for their food security and yearly income, and the months leading up to the rainy season can be very lean times.
Many farmers supplement their income by growing peanuts, a cash crop in Senegal. Using their loans to diversify their crops gives farmers more options and security when it is time to harvest.
This is precisely the time when farmers need to make their largest investments (equipment, seeds, and fertilizer) but for many the money from last year’s harvest has run out. Predatory lenders with high interest rates fill the need for loans, but at an extreme cost to farmers’ profits, all but ensuring that the next harvest won’t sustain the family for the full year.
This year we were able to DOUBLE the number of loans bringing our total to 200! This picture is of just some of the microloan recipients.
Our microloan program eases this burden by providing small zero-percent interest loans ahead of the rainy season so that farmers can purchase what they need to start their crops on time and maximize their yields and profits.
“This loan allowed me to buy a variety of seeds and fertilizer. After harvest I bought cement to start adding on to our home.
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This program has been running successfully for over a decade with a better than 99% repayment rate, and this year thanks to the generosity of our donors we DOUBLED the number of loans distributed to 200! We are so excited to see the impact this will have, and we hope to reach even more farmers next year.