Marina

Loan description:

Marina is 45 years old and married with four children. They all live together, with Marina's father, in a small community high up in the mountains surrounding the town of Vilcabamba. It takes about forty minutes to drive to Marina's house from the centre of town. Marina's youngest child is eight and her eldest is 23. They all still live at home. Her two youngest children go to school very close by their home and her second eldest child goes to high school, which is about 20 minutes away. Marina's husband is 63 and works in agriculture. As a child, Marina had polio and lost the use of both of her legs. She has been in a wheelchair from a very young age. Marina is a part of FACES credit hope programme, which provides low interest credit to clients with disabilities or family members with a disability. Marina has always been a very determined woman and despite her disability works hard to provide for her family. With the help of her eldest child and her father, Marina raises livestock - mainly pigs and chickens. She sells her fully-grown pigs to market traders in Loja, which is about an hour and half away, and sells her piglets locally. She sells her chickens both locally and in the town - it depends on the demand. Before Marina started raising livestock she used to stay at home fixing the clothes and shoes of people from the local area, which she still does occasionally, but this enterprise did not make her enough money so with the help of FACES she started raising livestock. This will be Marina's third loan from FACES and she will use it to buy some piglets and good quality feed. After about 4/5 months the piglets will be ready to sell and the profit she makes from this will be enough to keep on sending her children to school, especially her child who has to go to school 20 minutes away. Unlike before, Marina now makes enough profit to do more than just survive and she hopes that in the future she will be able to send all her children to college and that eventually they will all get good careers. Her eldest child has special educational needs so she wants to try to provide as good an education as possible for her. Marina will repay her loan over 12 months.