Iringa Hope visits 2013: An Interesting Day At Mlowa

Today we went to Mlowa, a village we had visited last year but had not heard much from since. Mlowa is located along the Ruaha road, about 90 minutes from Iringa. You head down the pavement to the northwest until you hit the washboard section of dirt; then grab your seat and hold on for the next hour or so of big potholes alternating with bad washboard and an occasional flat section.

When we got to Mlowa there seemed to be no one there. Itiweni had spoken with the pastor the night before so we were certain that they knew we were coming. In fact, the reason we were visiting is that a few weeks ago they once again contacted us and asked if we would come and talk with them.

Brown went to the pastor’s house and spoke with his wife. She came out and welcomed us and told us that the pastor would be coming soon. A few minutes later Pastor Chaula came riding up on his motorcycle. He greeted us and told us that he had announced a meeting in church but that no one had come for the meeting. He called the chairman from last year (who lives very close by) and asked him to come over.

When the chairman came we went into the pastor’s office to see what was up. Last year when we came there was a very enthusiastic group here. They told us that they had 108 people waiting to join and wanted to know how to proceed. Itiweni gave them a class on what is in the constitution, how the SACCOS works, how to organize, etc. They had selected three officers and sent them to our four day training session. We wondered what had happened since then.

As we talked to the chairman it gradually became clear what was going on. It seems that the crop the people here raise is about half “ground nuts” (peanuts to us), 35% rice (they have a certain amount of irrigated land), 10% maize, and some beans. The ground nuts are raised in large (10-30 acres) fields where they do not use any fertilizer, spray, etc. The rice is raised in moderate (about 1 – 2 acre) sized fields which also do not use anything beyond their basic seed. The maize is mainly raised beside the rice where they can use the left over water. Otherwise a maize crop does very poorly here. As a result, although they have seen how using fertilizer, spray, and better seed can raise their maize incomes (they told us that the yields go from 1-2 bags per acre to 7-8), there is not much interest since the “real money” is in the ground nuts and rice.

We asked about the average income here – it is about $700/year, higher than most areas we visit. We asked if they have alternate places to borrow and were told that they do. According to the chairman they can get three-month loans with an 8% per month interest rate. This works out OK he said because they have a 4 month growing season and the penalty for stretching from 3 to 4 months is not too large.

So why did they ask us to come and why were there so many people interested last year? It turns out that they had had a government SACCOS here. The SACCOS had started up with government money, offered no training, but people could borrow for any reason and only had to save a small amount before they got a loan. After about 2 years they all took out large loans and then did not pay the loans back. They told us that the government appointed manager then went around and asked for payment, but when no one paid he just went away – free money they all thought!

So when they heard about our SACCOS program they at first thought “more free money!” This was in 2010. At this point they had 184 people interested. When they heard that we, in fact, did demand payment and would not go away, these people all lost interest. Following this there was a group of 108 folks who became interested. They were all related and went to the Lutheran Church in Mlowa. They thought they would all join, the church would put in the money, and they would keep it in the family!

As a result when we came and told them that they had to admit all borrowers who passed our criteria, they realized that some of the family members would not get in and some of the outsiders would. It got even worse when they realized that there was no “free capital” for them to take over, but that they would have to save and contribute. Once this became clear, they all lost interest. The chairman told us that when he came back from our training he tried to hold a meeting on three different occasions and no one came.

It seems that the chairman did not want to give us bad news so he just told us what he thought we would want to hear. The pastor thought that with two Wazungus coming people would show up whether they were interested or not. He explained, however, that he has only been here a few months and did not realize that right now the people are staying in their fields to keep the elephants and monkeys away from their crops. Mlowa is very near Ruaha National Park and unless someone is in the fields, whole crops can disappear.

We went into the house and had chai and talked a bit more. Frankly it is good to understand some of the dynamics in these villages. We do not want to waste any time or money working on a solution that does not fit their problem. We are aware that there are other villages where a SACCOS is not really a good fit for their situation. I guess this just illustrates one of the reasons that we never push to go to a village, waiting instead for the village to invite us to come to them. Back to the University and more paperwork.