Chabilo 1007 Group

Based in southern Zambia, the women of Chabilo 1007 have an average age of 51 and care for a total 22 children. They have run self-started businesses including grocery and tailoring shops, as well as farming livestock in the vibrant city centre for the past six years. Alice (51) is a goat farmer and widowed mother to six children and one teenage orphan.

The entrepreneurs are a mixture of married and widowed women, who all work hard to provide books, uniforms and food for their children to attend school. They have also enlisted their spouses, friends and family to help out with their businesses. In the past, the women of Chabilo 1007 struggled to provide enough money for everyone in their family to live properly. Nevertheless, by starting and maintaining their own businesses they have not only transformed their own lives, but have started employing other people, thereby reducing the poverty levels in their local community. Having successfully repaid loans from Lendwithcare in the past, the group are now seeking another loan.

One of the group members is Alice, a fifty-one-year-old widow and mother to six children. Only one child still attends school along with an orphaned teenager also adopted by the family. Alice keeps goats to make a living, which she finds very rewarding as she is able to reap the fruits of her labour when she takes the livestock to market. She sells both goat milk and meat and earns enough to feed and send her family to good schools in the city. Now, she plans to use this loan to invest in vaccines for her herd to inoculate them against foot and mouth disease.

The Microloan Foundation in Zambia lend to female entrepreneurs using the ‘centre’ model. A centre is typically made up of 3-4 sub-groups and these sub-groups almost always have five members. Each centre has its own name and the sub-groups within the centre share the same name. Each person within the group of five women is responsible for repaying her loan but the members support each other and if a member is unable to repay her loan on time, then the group assumes responsibility for repayment. Loan officers provide training to the groups, although it is expected that centre leaders will eventually assume responsibility for providing some of the basic training.

If you are lending, please be aware that due to the current COVID-19 pandemic your repayments could be at greater risk of delay or default.