As Nuru’s Community Economic Development (CED) program grows, a key requirement for training emerges. We not only want to encourage farmers to save and offer them a secure place to keep their money, but we also want to impart to them the skills and knowledge to make wise decisions with the money that they have been able to save.
As we move towards the second half of the year and into the next one, we look to add to our training offerings. We are already well on our way to making sure that all the members have successfully completed trainings in: Group Solidarity, Group Constitutions, and The Importance of Savings. These are the core CED offerings that are a necessity to allow the group members to understand the benefits and work together to start the savings groups with CED. However, we don’t just want to stop there. As groups learn and adjust to maintaining regular savings, we also want to offer them courses that complement their level of financial understanding so they can better manage their money and make informed decisions. Because of this, we are in the process of implementing a class on “Needs vs. Desires” and are in the process of developing a curriculum on helping them to track their savings and loans.
Another course we are working to revise is one on loan management concepts. While CED helps to facilitate small loans amongst the group members, there are also a proliferation of banks, microfinance institutions (MFI’s) and other NGO’s that may offer loans that the farmers can utilize. Therefore, it is very important that they understand not only the loans offered but also the problems that can arise if they take a loan, or take multiple loans from multiple organizations. The better that they understand this the better choices they can make.
We hope that more clients continue to be added, more concepts understood by the members, and that new information be provided to help better manage their money. In addition, we want members to be equipped to prepare for economic shocks, provide for themselves and their families, make good financial decisions and know where their money is going.