Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Different Faces of Pif

Pay it Forward (PiF) is an international micro business development program that provides grants to persons of extreme poverty.  Recipients pay forward naturally to other members of their community.
There are different types of PiF as follows.
Enterprising Non-Profit Businesses
These are grants that are designed for a person who has demonstrated that they are able to start and operate a non-profit business. This person will adhere to proper business practices like registration of the business, having proper accounting in place, and having a dedicated bank account and proper filing.  The main aim is to be self sustainable and then pay forward to people living in extreme poverty in their communities. These funds range from $2000 to $5000 depending on the person’s ability to demonstrate proper business practices.
Below are pictures showing one of the successful ENPs in Arusha Tanzani.  Jackson Naiman received funds to purchase tour and travel car. His business offers East African tours to visitors from all over the world. He has been paying forward over the years to Willson Ngaiza from Bukoba, who, in turn, distributes the funds to people living in extreme poverty to start up small micro-businesses for self sustainability.

The above picture shows Bertha, one of the CNI staff members, standing next to the car during one of her visits.



The picture to the left shows Jackson Naiman on the right, his wife and Bertha on the left.


Collectives
These are grants that are designed to help a group of people or a community in an area of extreme poverty.  This is normally done in the form of a community project, whereby every member of the community benefits from the project. This has been well demonstrated in DR Congo. For instance, in Kahungu DRC, their collectives are grinding mills. The whole Kahungu village has benefited. No one has to walk long distances anymore to grind their grains, like maize, for food preparation. 
The picture above shows one of the grinding mills in DRC Kahungu.

Small Grants
In this category we have PiF One and PiF Two.  These are grants that are designed to help any person in any area of extreme poverty as long as they have a desire to work hard and be self-sufficient.  At a minimum, participants must match PiF grants with their own funds. For example, a $100 PiF grant must be matched by another $100 in cash or business start-up materials. PiF Two is the same except that the participants are given between $500 to $2000, depending on their ability to manage and control a business on that level. 
A good example is Geoffery, from a remote village of Ngorotwa in Kasanga. He received funds to expand his pharmacy kiosk and paid forward to the ladies who later started small businesses. Now he has build a laboratory as well. These pictures show the location of the village and the pharmacy kiosk itself.

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Katogota Farm, DR Congo

Comunity Based Initiatives (CoBI), working in the region of Bukavu, DR Congo, began a pig rearing venture a few months ago at a farm in Katogota.
So far, the project has been quite successful. In the first phase, CoBI purchased eight pigs, among them was one which was pregnant . Currently  there are three more that are pregnant.
There was only on unfortunate situation with one of the pigs. The pig gave birth to 11 little piglets. Unfortunately 7 died three days after, this was because the mother pig was unable to produce milk to feed the piglets.  It was after staff gaver her an injection that she started producing milk as reported by Djesse, the CoBI PiF leader. 
The four remaining piglets are now healthy. This problem was not detected earlier by the guards, and the people who sold the pigs to CoBI did not tell of the problem in advance.  The staff worked quickly to find a solution.
CoBI is learning from this and is looking forward for a great pig project.