Adding to basket
Seventy-five-year-old Rosa is a widow with two grown children who are forty-eight and fifty-two. Both have university degrees and are attorneys. She has three grandchildren. Rosa attended school for seven years because she is from a large family of six siblings.
For eleven years, Rosa has been selling cleaning and personal care products, shoes and jewelry. She sells some by catalog sales and as a street vendor. Rosa shares that part of the profits obtained in the businesses have been used to buy construction materials to improve her house.
She plans to use her seventh Kiva loan to buy more products on sale and at the wholesale level. Rosa shares, “I have been really pleased to have been able to access credit.”
Rosa was elected President of the Friendship Bridge Trust Bank “El Roble” or “The Oak” in the department/state of Quetzaltenango. There are seven other women in the group and most have the same businesses as Rosa. Others make “piñatas” or sew traditional aprons or men’s suits. Rosa calls the monthly meetings to order, the ladies make loan payments, and then a facilitator engages them in a training, part of the “Microcredit Plus” program. Topics include information about business, health, family and women. Every two months, a visiting nurse offers them consults, exams and family planning services. Both of these “plus” services are essential to their success!
Thank you, Kiva lenders, for lending a helping hand to Rosa and her friends!
In this group: Rosa Maria, Susana Patricia, Teresa Del Carmen, Fidelia , Maria Antonieta , Rosa Imelda , Ericka Jeannette, Reyna Virginia
