Iringa Hope visits 2012: A Visit to Tungamalinga

Tungamalinga lies about two hours north west of Iringa down a dirt road. We set off about 8 AM , planning on making a 10 o’clock meeting. The road would be OK for a few kilometers then suddenly, washboard set in that would do a Minnesota winter proud!!! At one point the car was shaking so violently that I was afraid that we would shake right off the road. Sandy remarked that this was the first ride she had had where she was able to get a massage while riding in the car!

We got there promptly at 10 only to discover that most of the SACCOS members were off working on an irrigation project. It seems that the village shares an irrigation system with another village. This system had broken in the morning and was now pouring water down a ditch rather than irrigating anything. Of the 60 members who had signed up to be there, 55 of them were off trying to fix the problem!

So, off we went to talk to some borrowers. The first man we visited owned a small corn trading shop. It turns out that while Tungamalinga sells a lot of rice, etc. they do not grow enough corn for the local demand for Ugali! To meet the demand this gentleman bought corn, hauled it to his shop and resold it locally. Noel is 46 years old, married, and the father of four. His first loan was for $200 to plant rice on an irrigated field. Combining a second loan with his profits from the rice, he took $670 and started his shop. Currently the profits from his shop allow him to send his eldest boy to teacher’s college, his next two to secondary school, and his youngest to a private primary school. His comment on his loans – “they were a must.”

We went on down the street and met with another farmer. George, 46, had borrowed $200 to plant rice on 3 acres. Using his profits plus another loan for $400 allowed him to buy another 4 acres of land. On this land he planted rice and sunflowers. His third loan of $400 went to plant 5 acres of rice and 3 acres of sunflowers. With the profits from this he is building a house for himself and his 6 children. He is also sending his two eldest children to secondary school.

Finally enough members had come back from working on the irrigation system so we could start. The meeting went well with no surprises. As it was breaking up several of the SACCOS members came up to greet me. It seemd clear that they had rehearsed their talk – “You have given us hope for the future of our children. God bless you – God bless you – God bless you . . .” I finally escaped.

Reviewing the records with the SACCOS officers we were impressed. This group had started with 5,500,000 schillings (about $3,700) and had grown their capital to 24,284,400 – an increase of 340%!! They had done this by having members buy shares, save from their profits, and receiving interest from the loans the members took our – nzuri sana (good work).

While looking at their books we noticed that there were 8 loans marked as behind. So what was this? It turns out that 8 members had a crop failure last year. Rather than give up, the loan committee had met with them and suggested that they forgive the interest for a time and reschedule the loan over a longer period – good thinking! The members were now repaying their loans and the SACCOS was sure it would get all of its money back.

Driving back to Iringa we could not help but believe that it would have been better if the US had had some of the good sense of this committee when our housing crisis hit.