Economic Growth Malawi Project #6133

Provide long-term livings for 300 women in Malawi

by MicroLoan Foundation

Project Report | Jan 30, 2012
Social performance management at MicroLoan

By Rita and Rupy | Project Leaders

Social Performance Management at MicroLoan

What is social performance management? It is about improving the quality, effectiveness and efficiency of what we are already doing, at all levels of the organisation, in order to meet clients’ needs more effectively and fulfill the social mission, that being to work with the poorest women and enable them to move out of poverty.

Why is social performance important to MicroLoan?

It is a clear way to understand how we are performing against our social goals or what steps may need to be taken in order to improve social performance, to ensure we are on track in fulfilling our social mission. We need to look at if we are in fact reaching the poorest individuals and making a difference in their lives.

Consequently innovative products, that meet client’s needs, such as Chiyambi (product aimed at the poorest) and Makwelero (monthly repayment product) have been successfully piloted.

How is Social Performance improved?

Social Performance can be improved in any number of ways, depending on the needs of the organisation. In MicroLoan’s case for example, we have been focusing on improving our client training to ensure that it is more structured and participatory, so that clients form well functioning groups and are well equipped with the necessary skills to run a successful business. We’ve also been working on integrating client protection principles into our day to day work to ensure our clients are not over-indebted, understand their rights and are given regular opportunities to feed back their thoughts to management so we can continuously work to improve our products and services.

Your donations and support are greatly appreciated; it truly helps us reach the poorest women in Sub-Saharan Africa and gives them the opportunity to receive a hand up from poverty.

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Oct 12, 2011
Malawi field work activities this year

By Rupy and Alice | Project Leaders

Veronica

"Tilime" agricultural loans - Our agronomist volunteer Leslie Lyle has carried out a second research trip to Malawi, introducing new procedures. These changes appear to have been successful and the quality of client understanding of agricultural issues and the quality of the farming practices has improved as a result. This places clients in a stronger position when planning their farming activities, and coping with the current challenges of depressed crop prices. The regular MicroLoan workshops and inputs by local agricultural expert officers are helping the women diversify their crops more successfully. In order to implement our new staff training curriculum, we have placed a long term volunteer (Melanie Harbinson) for one year trialling and testing the Deloitte UK developed training modules so they can be subsequently fully rolled out as a 'MicroLoan curriculum'. This should not only lead to better performing staff but will be a key motivation tool, as staff clearly value investment in their own personal development. One of our new initiatives is 'solar enterprise'. Only 8% of Malawians are connected to the national grid so solar energy is extremely important. We are training and mentoring our clients in marketing, how to work and repair devices, and managing stock. In our picture is Veronica, whom Michael McGrath (Head of Fundraising) and Ida Levine (Trustee) met in May. With her tea shop failing to generate sufficient income, she is now making a significant amount of additional money from solar initiatives. It was amazing to learn that she has pre-orders for this service for the next month and a local school wants to purchase her entire next stock of ten solar packs! You can see her here, alongside her solar panels, charging a box of LED lamps and mobile phones for her local customers.

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Mar 10, 2011
MicroLoan's Solar Women

By Deniz Hassan | Digital Marketing and Communications Manager

Our first Solar Women - funded by you

Your donations are already working really hard - thank you so much! You've helped fund our latest project - our Solar Women.

With just 8% of Malawians connected to a national grid and even that becoming increasingly unreliable of late, MicroLoan has been developing some new business opportunities for the women we help to benefit from solar energy.

Imagine being totally constrained by nature for the ability to read or to undertake certain critical tasks, just because it is after 6pm? This is the reality for many women and their families in Africa, with their only lighting up until now being from kerosene lamps and candles. These not only offer poor light, but also have a whole host of health problems associated with them. Kerosene lamps are huge contributor to respiratory problems, particularly amongst children and are the cause of horrendous burns and even fatalities if accidentally knocked over, as is easily done in cramped conditions.Candles can also prove dangerous and are a relatively costly expense every day.

Enter clean, safe and reliable solar energy.

MicroLoan has set up nine new women as solar entrepreneurs in and around the Kasungu area. The product consists of a small 1.5w solar panel, an LED light, a mobile phone battery charger and battery pack which stores the solar energy. It has been specifically designed for poor rural settings.

The women were selected on the basis of their successful business backgrounds and their ability to sell new products well. The women attended a two and a half day training workshop in Kasungu during which time they learned how their panels worked, how to repair faulty units, how to charge clients mobile batteries, how to find clients and how to record their sales.

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