Entrepreneur
Name
Mabel
Member since
March 2016
On-time repayments
243 installments • 87%
About Me
I was born in Kakamega county in Kenya. I was brought up in our village by my own parents who were peasant farmers on half acre of land where we all lived with my eleven siblings. When I was young, i worked on the farm during my free time after school since i was the eldest in the family. I walked bear feet to school every day like 8km. I walked back home every lunch time to take lunch. When I finished primary school, i passed well and was called to a national school but could not go far from home since it was expensive. I joined the nearest secondary school and passed my final exams very well, then the government gave me a loan to continue with university education. I completed university and was unable to get a job since i still lived in the village. So i started volunteering to take care of vulnerable people in the community for free. Many of them did not know that government offered help for such people. So I helped them to register themselves for government help and also equipped them with life skills like knitting, inspiring other people etc I helped them to start their own income generating activities and in the process i started a community based project of selling cereals in order to support a community based school for orphans and less fortunate children in Masai land. This helps to maintain the children in the school since they come from challenged backgrounds and they cant afford education. I visit different parts of Kenya and I usually find there are millions of vulnerable people who are suffering, through the NGO that I run I can reach out to more people who need help. The vulnerable people i work with include: orphaned children in Masailand (where we have female genital mutilation, early marriage and lack of education for children since they practice cultural life of pastoralists), the aged and disabled people and poor people. They spend their childhood looking after cattle and moving around for greener pastures. I also work with poor people who are unable to have any sustainable livelihood for themselves. I help them to get into income generating activities like agriculture, beadmaking, working on farms in groups etc
I chose to work with vulnerable people because I want them to have a sustainable livelihood which will help them to live a better life which will lead to better education for their children and community. This will mean improved livelihood for the community members.
My Business
My income source is from baking and selling of cakes in order to sustain the activities of serving the poor in the community like the orphans in the school in Masai land. I do this so that we sell the cakes and get extra income to sustain the education of the poor children that I support. The profits help me to sustain the activities of the school for the orphans in Masai land, Narok county and also helps other activities for the NGO to keep running.
So i work hard to keep the business running by sourcing for more customers to buy from me the cakes. If Zidisha supports me I will buy part of the baking equipments to help me make more cakes so as to make profit to support the children in the school for the less fortunate.
Loan Proposal
The loan that Zidisha will give me will help me to purchase more baking flour and other ingredients. This will result in baking more and more while sourcing for customers. Once customers know that the bakery products are readily available, they will come to purchase any time of the day. Unlike now when we used to bake and the products get finished before the end of the day because we depended on the profit made to purchase more flour and other baking ingredients. This has been a major challenge because when customer comes and finds you dont have the product ready, they go to other options thus not giving us the business.
I will be very happy when I am given this loan because I will be able to bake enough to meet the customer demands.
I look forward to this loan which will also help me to employ more people to help with the business since we will get more busy. This will go a long way in helping the community youths who tend to be idle without any work to do.
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Loan Info
Project Type
Classic Loan
Disbursed amount
$1,281.00
Date disbursed
Sep 10, 2017
Repayment status
Late
Projected term
62 months
Other loans
Lenders
San Francisco, United States
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United States
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Germany
Seattle, Washington, United States
Austria
United Kingdom
Ask Mabel a question about this project, share news and photos of your own, or send a simple note of thanks or inspiration.
Margaret Aug 21, 2017
Margaret Apr 10, 2017
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