A little loan goes a long way in Port Sudan
24 August 2005 To a casual observer, Hassanat and Christina may look like no more than two typical African market women, minding their tiny stalls in a bustling market street on the outskirts of Port Sudan. Yet, as they shuffle through the dust, greeting customers and setting up their wares, the gleam in their eyes says everything but “victim.” Rather than dwelling on their difficult circumstances, Hassanat and Christina are busy working themselves and their families out of poverty.
There is little indication of the struggles of their past, or the formidable obstacles they have managed to overcome to get to where they are today. They are students, entrepreneurs, mothers (in Christina's case, a single mother of nine). Simply put, they are two of Sudan's hardest-working women.
Displaced by one of Africa's most violent civil wars, Hassanat (originally from the Nuba mountains) and Christina (a Nuer woman from Bahr El-Ghazal region) both arrived in the shantytowns of Port Sudan over a decade ago.
Like 40,000 other displaced Southerners, the women and their families tried to cobble together simple shacks and shelters out of corrugated tin, mud bricks and plastic sheeting. Neither had an education, a prospect of a job, or much hope for the future: Growing up as an orphan Christina had never seen the inside of a school building, while Hassanat was too busy trying to eke out a living with odd jobs to stay in classes.
An early marriage to a (mostly unemployed) soldier kept Christina out of school and busy with pregnancies and child-care duties ”“ that is, until her husband walked out three years ago and left Christina to fend for herself.
So when she heard that a group of displaced women like her and Hassanat were getting together to improve their lives with the support of international aid agency Oxfam, Christina decided to change her fate by joining them. With some initial funding from Oxfam, these women were able to start a micro-credit programme that allows each group member to take out a small loan to start a local business.
With an initial loan of 25,000 dinar (approximately $100), these two women's businesses were born: while Christina set off to buy a jerry can of oil and some flour to sell biscuits and cakes in a tea stall at the market, Hassanat (a mother of four) purchased some flour, a few eggs, and a spaghetti-making machine, and began selling dried pasta from house to house on the streets of Habila.
A mere 10 months later, Christina was seeing her profits increase handsomely at the tea stall, and Hassanat had started supplying not only local households, but also small businesses. Both women had paid back their original loan ”“ and Hassanat almost immediately applied for a second one.
This time, Hassanat invested 50,000 dinars (approximately $200) to buy a refrigerator and transformed herself into a successful ice cream vendor. Soon her neighbours and relatives were so inspired by her achievements that they began ordering small batches of her ice cream to sell on the street themselves. Today Hassanat is one of the market's most well-known wholesale ice cream vendors, while still maintaining her prime vending patch in front of the local primary school. And just like before, her loan to the women's group is long paid off.
“God willing, I will get another loan soon,” laughs Hassanat. “Then I can buy a second refrigerator to expand my business. And maybe after that, I will buy a moto-rickshaw to transport my goods to other shops in town.”
“With the money we have earned, we have been able to build ourselves proper homes, made out of concrete. We can pay our children' school fees and buy medicines for them when they get sick. Every single one of my nine children is in school,” Christina says proudly, leaning back in her seat to survey the small collection of bright plastic stools lined up in front of her tea stall. Her two oldest boys are now getting ready to graduate from high school, a significant achievement in Christina's poverty stricken neighbourhood.
“I am more confident now than I was before, and I have decided to improve my own education,” she adds. “Because my parents died when I was young, I never had the chance to go to school. For the past year, I have been attending free evening classes at one of Oxfam's night schools, and I am even learning some English.”
Hassanat, who also attends the adult literacy classes, insists that a business like hers can turn a woman's life around. “The women's group showed me that I was not alone; that there was a lot I could achieve even with just a little bit of support. Today I work as a group leader and manage the loans for other women who are trying to open a small business. I know they look up to those of us who have made it, and I am here to tell them that they can succeed just like I did.”
It may seem like an unlikely career path for a two women from one of the poorest pockets of the African continent, but Hassanat and Christina illustrate that ”“ with the right motivation and initiative ”“ just a little bit of support from Oxfam can go a long way towards building a brighter future.
