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Eldoret, AMPATH microfinance, pediatric clinic, farm

This morning, Daddy, Jay, and I visited the microfinance part of AMPATH, led by Peter Park. It looks better put-together than the Reach Out one we saw in Kampala, Uganda. We have more confidence in the leaders of the AMPATH program here in El Doret. They're smaller and younger but they seem to have good ideas. For example, they require all their clients to undergo a month of business training before they access a loan. They've categorized loans into beginner, intermediate, and advanced:

• Beginner is someone who's never done business before. They get a small loan--maybe $50--and have an annual interest rate of 5%. That's really low. The Reach Out interest rate is 10% over six months!
• Intermediate is for people who had a business and had to sell it because they came down with AIDS. These people can't get a loan elsewhere because they have nothing to prove that they have business experience. The intermediate loan has the same annual 5% interest rate but they get bigger loans, like $100.
• Expert loans are for people who currently have a successful business. AMPATH doesn't charge any interest for these loans because they want successful business people to join the program to teach beginners and intermediates how to do business.

The AMPATH microfinance program is about a year old and has about 200-300 clients. The first year was a pilot program where they explored different microfinance tactics. The repayment rate was an abysmal 5% because clients used the money from the loan or from the profits to buy food to eat. They were starving! The program now includes food and training, and the repayment rate so far (post-pilot) is an amazing 92%.

Mommy visited the farming part of AMPATH this morning. AMPATH runs a model farm where it trains clients to be farmers. An ex-peace corps volunteer from England designed the farm. Three workers attend to three cows: two chop grass and a third feeds molasses to increase the cow's appetite. Since the cows don't move from their pen, this is called "zero-grazing." It's meant for farmers who don't have much land. The irrigation mechanism, an Approtech pump, requires the farmer to perform Stairmaster-like stepping for hours every day. A farmer with AIDS might not have the strength.

In the afternoon, Jay and I visited a pedatric AIDS clinic at a nearby village with Jill, a young American doctor who is halfway through her year here. Most kids were healthy and just came in for their monthly checkup. Jill poked their bellies, looked in their eyes, opened their mouths, and talked in Swahili with the parent. Jill said that she doesn't know how long children born with AIDS can expect to live because they've only had ARVs for a few years. The oldest AIDS child she's treated is 13.

The adult who brings the child to the clinic is invariably female: an aunt, a sister, or the mother. Men need to get more involved in caring for children.

posted by Li at 11:51 AM