About Me

I am James Adika 33 years old,married with two children. I live in Rusinga Island and have a leather craft shop in Rusinga town just a 42kilometers in the outskirts of Homa-Bay. Rusinga Island is a fishing community town with a well structured fishing enterprises whose market is Nairobi city the largest city in East and central Africa. There is a huge ready market for the leather products at very competitive prices. Since I make leathered couches ,motorbike seat covers, car cushions which are used to ferry fish to the banda, where they are being weighed.

I have not gone so far with my education because of a lot of financial issues in my family, so I decided to venture into the business to be able to raise school fees for my self and to supplement my family income. Since I had no one to help me, I started with one sewing machine. I thank zidisha for my first loan which I used to add one sewing machine, but I have a challenge of getting raw materials, since I order them from Nairobi. The cost of transport has steadily risen with time thus becoming expensive for me to afford to enhance the quality of my products. The earnings from the sale, were used to order few materials but with the family basic needs it could not be adequate. I trust that with the loan from Zidisha, I will be able to order more materials and also be able to renovate my business premise . Thank you.

My Business

My wife runs a kiosk where we sell basic leather products for example: Gadget bags, School bags, and a few Handicrafts. She is a very supportive and understanding woman, has encouraged me so much to apply for this loan, as she is willing to help me raise the installments as we work together to the success of the leather craft project, as it is more profitable. This will be for an interim period of three months as we wait for the leather products be of better quality for the market. The three months are enough to bring us enough money that can be re-invested in the project for expansion purposes. This will ensure self sustainability for both her shop and the leather project. I look forward to expanding the Craft shop to a level whereby it will be supplying other Islands with leather products at the same time.

My dream is to start a Leather-Craft Academy that can be used as an education center to the youth who are trying to venture into a similar business as a way of dealing with unemployment.

I had a plan of starting a program of sewing school bags for girls at comparative prices for nearby Kindergartens and primary schools. Now that raining in Kenya and pupils are on holidays I would order for raw materials at 130$ and make more bags so that as they reopen I would be able to deliver to them on time.

And the rest 20$ I will use to renovate my business premises thus attract more customers

I hope I will do quality bags and seats to counter the big demand in my area.