Kiva conducts regular, ongoing monitoring of all Lending Partners, but only posts status updates here in response to relevant, major changes at the partner.

Status update — February 23, 2016

SJedi Green Energy partnership with Kiva has been closed following closure of their program in Liberia. 

Since joining Kiva as an experimental partner in May 2014, SJedi experienced difficulties in their credit program mainly due to difficulties in the economic and operating environment within Liberia. They joined Kiva around the time when Ebola outbreak was reported in Liberia and other West African countries. While Kiva allowed SJedi to continue fundraising during this period, the outbreak turned out to be the most widespread virus disease in history, with devastating effects on SJedi’s operations and the local economy. The resultant economic and health burden, in combination with travel restrictions in and out of the country, severely affected borrowers’ abilities to operate their businesses and to meet their loan obligations. Despite many efforts to encourage borrowers to repay, SJedi also experienced widespread non-repayment of their loans, resulting into high delinquencies for Kiva loans since July 2015.  

With the closure of SJedi’s program in Liberia, no further recoveries are expected from these borrowers and thus the remaining $15,466.71 in outstanding amounts due to Kiva lenders has now been defaulted. 

Status update — August 6, 2015

The repayment grace period for Lending Partners affected by the Ebola outbreak in West Africa concluded at the end of May 2015. Kiva has started the process of establishing the status of all outstanding Kiva loans made through these partners. The goal is to identify the actual amounts repaid by Kiva borrowers to the partner during the grace period, identify loans that have since become delinquent and require rescheduling of original repayment terms, as well as those that will be defaulted or written off. Once Kiva has more complete information on the status of the Lending Partner's portfolio we'll provide that information here.

Status update — March 10, 2015

Kiva is extending the existing grace period for Lending Partners impacted by the Ebola outbreak until the end of May 2015. This will allow the partners time to carry out comprehensive audits of their operations, and to share information with Kiva on outstanding loans and their plans going forward.

Sjedi Green Energy operates in Liberia, one of the countries in West Africa that was most affected by the Ebola outbreak. As a result, Sjedi had to cut back it's operations but continued to post new loans to Kiva. The organization has seen high delinquency rates because of the difficult economic situation and is extending loan terms for borrowers to reduce monthly payments. They hope to resume normal operations in the spring. 

Status update — October 23, 2014

Sjedi Green Energy operates in Liberia, one of the countries in West Africa currently experiencing an Ebola outbreak. This epidemic is the largest in history, claiming thousands of lives and having a deep impact on the national economy. Sjedi is continuing to operate throughout the outbreak, but accordingly these loans will have a higher risk associated with them. Learn more about the epidemic here. 

SJedi Green Energy is an organization established in Liberia that is the sole distributor of Envirofit International (EF) cookstoves in the country. It targets the Base of Pyramid (BoP) consumers, many of whom earn less than $2 per day. 

Since 2011, the company has operated as a wholesale distributor of EF cookstoves and has successfully utilized a variety of distribution models including direct, institutional, whole seller and NGO partner. Additionally, SJedi is working to pilot the sale and distribution of other products such as solar home systems, water filter systems, bed-nets and Green Charcoal.

Partner Description

A unique lending approach:

SJedi Green Energy provides cookstoves to the portion of the population who are unable to purchase them on their own. Each loan of will be used for the purchase of cookstoves and solar home systems. With 0% interest, customers should be able to pay back for the products within six months. SJedi will assign their own field officers to be responsible for the collection of payments from borrowers. With Kiva’s support, SJedi will be able to increase the quantity of their sales by allowing the majority of BoP customers to apply for micro financing, receive the product, and pay off the loan in a maximum of 24 months.