Mukwela 1003 Group

Mukwela 1003 is a group of five women entrepreneurs from Southern Province, Zambia, aged between 28 and 50 years. Four members are married, while one is single. Together, they care for 28 children and share the vision of achieving financial freedom and improving their families’ living conditions. The women operate various businesses, including grocery shops, fish trading, and pig and goat trading.

Jerica is a 32-year-old single mother of one child who also cares for two orphans. She is a member of the group and works hard to provide food, education, healthcare and other essential needs for her family.

For the past four years, Jerica has operated a grocery shop that supplies everyday household products to customers in her community. The business is an important source of income for her household. From her previous loan she was able to order more goods which improved her working capital and serve more customers.

Jerica plans to use her share of the group loan to purchase additional grocery stock and expand her product range. With more goods available, she hopes to meet customer demand and increase her income. Other members want to order more goods as well.

The Microloan Foundation, Lendwithcare's local partner in Zambia employs a unique 'centre' model for lending to female entrepreneurs. A centre comprises several sub-groups which share the same name as the centre. As such, you may have seen similarly named group loans from Zambia all belonging to the same centre. In this system, each woman is individually responsible for repaying her loan, but the group offers mutual support by assuming overall responsibility together.