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Micro-Credit Programs
CORAfrica will establish microcredit opportunities in rural areas especailly where its Community Education Centers (CECs) exist. Such a program will facilitate banking and loan repayment systems that would make possible the disbursement of low-interest soft loans to poor rural farmers, especially women. This will help CORAfrica manage a form of credit building for farming communities to support agricultural activities and other small business ventures that will in turn help parents and guardians pay for their children's education.
The program will enlist rural farmers (men and women) by training them locally in credit building, with a focus on self-reliance, strategic marketing, massive production and storage of home food items. This credit facility will in future advance farmers with materials such as fertilizers, agro-chemicals, seeds, farm implements and other needs.
Recent Progress:
A Micro-finance Workshop held in Ipong-Obudu, Nigeria
In July 2007, a 4-day intensive training on micro-finance initiatives and sustainable development to rural communities was organized for the Ipong-Obudu community in Cross River State, Nigeria. The workshop, which was intended to intensify in villagers a sense of solid economic security and business ownership, was a joint venture of Children of Rural Africa (CORAfrica) and the Sophia Foundation for health, education and development, a local NGO in Cross River State.
The workshop was conceived by CORAfrica as a way of intensifying the organizational role of faith-based institutions for poverty alleviation in Nigeria. Due to the lack of alternative institutions to counter the social processes entrenched in local settings, poverty is easily becoming intensive in rural villages. CORAfrica offers a communitarian approach to poverty eradication by choosing a particular parish and selecting key individual women and men to lead others in the new scheme that is geared towards capacity building for individuals as well as strengthening existing groups within a particular parish setting. For example in St Theresa’s parish where the program will take off, there exists ten Basic Christian Communities (BCCs) corresponding to village units. Participants were drawn from the villages of Kakum, Bebuagbong, Bebuatsuan, Bebuabie, Begiaba, Kutiang and Igwo. There were 50 participants in all.
The 50 participants at the workshop
Monday, July 9th, was the kick-off day for the workshop, with introductory sessions bordering on the objective of the workshop, key principles of adult learning and the role of Parishes and Basic Christian communities in the scheme. The second day was centered on basic accounting principle in the microfinance scheme, review of training methods and marketing strategies at the community level. During the third day, attention was drawn to project area and member selection criteria, community entrepreneurship and assets management and group formation procedures. The final day was focused on exploring the concept of savings and how to identify profitable community projects. There were 13 sessions in all, each of which was followed by group discussions for 20 minutes. Members often regrouped after each group discussion for a plenary session where the larger group was fed back and further discussions and resolutions were made on each topic.
A group discussion in progress
During the closing ceremonies held on Thursday, June 13th, the coordinator of CORAfrica in Nigeria and Parish Priest of St. Theresa’s Parish in Ipong, Fr. Peter ‘Obele’ Abue lauded both participants and facilitators for showing such enormous zeal during the workshop. He remarked that the intensity of poverty in rural areas calls for new strategies that involve churches at the very center of the initiatives. Churches bring in their values to bear, in order to counteract the dominant strategies that have left much to be desired in poverty alleviation programs. He drew examples from the success of micro-credit initiatives in other countries like India and Bangladesh and enjoined that the scheme can also be successful in Nigeria if churches throw in their weight on the program. Why CORAfrica considers this initiative pivotal to its outreach programs is that with viable economic loci, poor families rearing children in rural areas can garner up resources to boast their agricultural and other business enterprises. This will in turn enable them to adequately afford basic education and healthcare for their rural children.
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The end of the ceremonies witnessed the giving of certificates to trainers who were empowered to go and train others in their local communities. There were scores of entertainment to grace the occasion such as traditional dances, drama and group photographs. In his closing remarks, a traditional ruler in Kakum village, Chief Joseph Ugbe, lauded the organizers of the program and observed that in the past villagers have never been considered important to take on such initiatives. He envisaged its success in the near future and further pleaded with funding agencies to consider the support of sincere villagers who possessed latent business skills to improve their lots.
 
Workshop participants receiving their certificates
Participants were handed their certificates after the workshop as can be seen in our Photo Gallery.
Report by Victor Otu
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