Thursday, October 10, 2024

Oloshaiki Women Group

img 0173 origOloshaiki Women's group started in 2005 and currently has 21 members. The group is chaired by Jonah who is also the chair of the group ranch in Olandi. The group started with each member contributing 10 shillings and later increased to 100 shillings. With this money, the group bought one cow and one goat for fattening. They also engaged in table banking where a “merry-go-round” system was practiced. With the money contributed and from the selling of livestock, they help each other by buying utensils, clothes, building houses and wedding gifts.

Later in the years, they had a total of five cattle but lost three of them in 2009 resulting from a prolonged drought. Currently the group has twelve cattle and upon selling, the profit is shared among the members to see the value of the group.

The group promotes education, livestock keeping and farming. They did however express some challenges:
Water scarcity is a major issue for this group as they currently pay for their domestic water use on a meter. Their dream is to have access to a borehole which would facilitate irrigation for farming.
High illiteracy rates among adults and discontinuation of education for children due to lack of funds for school fees. They wish to create a platform for schooling sponsorship, operate a bursary program and also run some basic adult education seminars. They hope that this will raise the importance of education within the community.
The group lacks a stable saving system and currently relies on investment in livestock. With more information, the group hopes to establish an official banking system and access funds or loans through the bank.img 0129 1 orig

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