LOAN 1: SUPPORTING A STRUGGLING BUSINESS
When everyone who wanted to take out a loan had finished explaining her needs, President Aminata opened each request to discussion in turn. She began again with Bintou. Bintou stood in the middle of the circle, listening to the discussion going on around her.
Occasionally the group decided not to lend to someone or to ask a member to come to the next meeting with a revised plan more likely to result in timely payback. Other times they had to offer loans smaller than requested, depending on the amount of money available in the group fund at the time. Since it was their own savings that they were lending, the group was understandably cautious. That said, the members generally wanted to make loans because the loans would be repaid with interest. The more loans they make that are successfully repaid, the more money they accrue at the end of the savings cycle.Bintou hoped her previous experience selling in the market would convince her fellow group members that she could easily make enough profits to pay back the loan and its interest, as well as earn a profit for herself and her family. One woman in particular disagreed. Assiatou argued that Bintou had missed her savings contributions at least once before, at the end of the lean season last year, before her family’s harvest had come in. She wondered aloud how well Bintou fit her business—including the long walk to and from the Soma market—around all her household chores, agricultural labor, and childcare, as the season wore on.
Another woman responded to Aminata. Fanta was well respected because of her age and because she was the oldest woman in her large extended family, which included her husband and six children, a younger co-wife and her four children, and her husband’s two younger brothers, their wives, and their children. Like Tabika, one of her sons worked in Bamako and her husband earned a regular salary, working as a schoolteacher, so her family had more money and was more educated than most in the village. She managed that household and her own garden and found time to cook and sell hot meals outside her home most evenings, stocking up on ingredients with regular loans from her savings group, where she saved five shares per week. Fanta’s opinion mattered, so when Fanta told the group that she’d seen Bintou sell out of her wares in the Soma market before, those who had been skeptical eased off. In the savings group, personal relationships replaced collateral as assurance that borrowers would repay their loans. Those who trusted Fanta believed in Bin- tou. Since Fanta was already well respected in the group, her endorsement meant a lot to the other members.
At this point President Aminata stood and asked the group’s members whether they thought Bintou should get her loan. A chorus of “Awo,” yes in Bambara, went up, and Ami- nata looked pointedly at those who had expressed disagreement earlier. Assiatou and a few others nodded yes.