Funded

Total loan: $7,000

Nellious' Group

Mwahera, Kenya / Agriculture

A loan helped a member to purchase tree farm inputs, such as eucalyptus seedlings and fertilizer and to pay for technical training and tree farm maintenance.

Nellious' Group's story

Nellious is the leader of Nellious' Group. She is a 29-year-old farmer and mother of four children. She keeps cattle and grows maize, cassava, and legumes on her farm. Her husband works as an Assistant Chief. The major challenges she faces are drought, pests, and diseases, and she lacks the capital she needs to grow her business.

She decided to join KOMAZA's tree planting program for "an improved standard of living, be it health, education, clothing and housing" for her family. She also hopes to improve her knowledge of farming through the training she will receive from KOMAZA. She plans to use the money she makes from her tree farm to educate her children and build a new house.

Two additional farmers pictured are Kangombe, a KOMAZA-Kiva farmer that will be part of another loan group, and Kache, an interested farmer but she is unable to plant trees with KOMAZA this season.

In this group: Nellious, Masha, Esther, Kenneth, Fatuma, Rahel, Josphine, Michael, Dama, Rahel, Kadzo, Kadzo, Dama, Riziki

More about this loan

About KOMAZA Forestry Ltd.:

KOMAZA is a social enterprise founded to convert Africa?s drylands into productive family farms in the eastern part of Kenya. The organization equips smallholder farmers with the supplies and training they need to plant fast-growing and sustainable eucalyptus or melia trees on their unused or underutilized land. In addition to generating income for farmers and their families, KOMAZA's sustainable farming practices help to offset deforestation and provide a stable, affordable source of fuel.

Please note that this loan term is for 10 years. KOMAZA works with farmers over the course of this time period to help them grow healthy and regenerative trees that are then sold as wood commodities. This loan will cover the upfront cost of seeds, fertilizers, and KOMAZA?s staff time needed to support the farmer over the course of the loan term, including multiple harvest cycles.

This model generates years of income for the farmers? families and creates a sustainable wood supply for local markets. Kiva lenders? flexible, risk-tolerant capital enables KOMAZA to offer affordable financing to farmers, and to scale faster as an organization to impact more people. Repayments for this loan will come from revenues generated by wood sales, and profits from harvested trees are split equally between the farmer and KOMAZA.

See the story of Ruth and Raphael, KOMAZA farmers, here: