Ecumenical loan fund backs Philippines small businesses
-19/05/06
Entrepreneurs with s
Ecumenical loan fund backs Philippines small businesses
-19/05/06
Entrepreneurs with small businesses in the northern Philippines say a church-backed financing programme has helped improve the overall quality of their lives and also helped to strengthen their Christian faith, reports Maurice Malanes for Ecumenical News International.
“I thank the Lord Jesus Christ for giving us ECLOF (Ecumenical Church Loan Fund) because without it, my family would not be where we are now,” said Estrella Baliang, aged in her 50s, who buys and sells socks, jackets and other clothes. “With the ECLOF backing, our business continues to grow.”
Currently operating in 30 developing countries, including the Philippines, ECLOF is an ecumenical organization begun in 1946 in Switzerland through the initiative of visionary church leaders with the support of Christian bankers. It has a special alliance with the Geneva-based World Council of Churches and Netherlands-based Oikocredit.
Due to good business, Baliang and her husband managed to send their five children to school. The eldest graduated from a course in criminology in April, which Baliang says is testimony to “God’s goodness”.
Peter Dao-ines, 55, a farmer who cultivates strawberries has a similar opinion of the church-backed financing service.
“Through the loans, we were not only able to pay our land rentals, and improve our business, we were also able to pay our tithes in our church,” he says. “So, I also thank the Lord for ECLOF.” For his strawberry growing business, Dao-ines rents about 2500 square meters of land from the Benguet State University.
“We used to borrow from private moneylenders who would charge us usurious interests. But we are now grateful for having found Eclof,” notes Gloria Pagoy, aged 58, who cultivates flowers. These are in big demand on All Saints Day (1 November), Valentines Day, Christmas, and during the traditional wedding months from April to June. “With ECLOF’s low interest, we recover our investments and even get modest earnings.”
Before she discovered ECLOF in 2003, Pagoy had four greenhouses that she was able to build up over a number of years. With the loans from ECLOF, Pagoy was able to immediately build another greenhouse.
“Since Eclof is a good finance backer, I always tell members of my group to stay credible and be prompt in repaying our loans,” says Pagoy.
Baliang, Dao-ines, and Pagoy are among 1,450 borrowers from Eclof Philippines’ Benguet branch in the north of the southeast Asian country. Most of them have success stories and experiences of faith to recount. Eclof-Philippines has thousands of other clients in other parts of the country, most of them small entrepreneurs and farmers.
ECLOF clients interviewed by Ecumenical News International concurred that their loans, at 2.5 per cent interest plus rebates, are more affordable and accessible than commercial bank lending and loans from private moneylenders. The minimum loan commercial banks offer is 1 million pesos (19,150 US dollars), which small entrepreneurs and farmers cannot afford. Eclof, on the other hand, lends amounts as small as 5,000 pesos (96 dollars) to as high as 300,000 pesos.
Clients also say they appreciate the capacity-building training provided through ECLOF. Pagoy cites courses on how to manage a business and basic cash recording, and another on Christian leadership and stewardship, which ECLOF clients completed in April. “This training is not given when you loan from a bank or from a private money lender,” she said.
In explaining the “fair-credit-to-promote-human-development” goal of ECLOF, its international director Muhungi F. Kanyoro declared: “Our clients must succeed in improving their lives through the loans ECLOF extends; otherwise, we fail. The measure of our success is not just the repayment rates of loans but the positive impact of the loans on the lives of the clients.”
Kanyoro was in the Philippines along with directors and staff from other countries during April. One of their tasks was to assess how ECLOF has fared since it was established 50 years ago.
See here for more information about the Ecumenical Church Loan Fund.
[With acknowledgements to ENI. Ecumenical News International is jointly sponsored by the World Council of Churches, the Lutheran World Federation, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, and the Conference of European Churches.]
Ecumenical loan fund backs Philippines small businesses
-19/05/06
Entrepreneurs with small businesses in the northern Philippines say a church-backed financing programme has helped improve the overall quality of their lives and also helped to strengthen their Christian faith, reports Maurice Malanes for Ecumenical News International.
“I thank the Lord Jesus Christ for giving us ECLOF (Ecumenical Church Loan Fund) because without it, my family would not be where we are now,” said Estrella Baliang, aged in her 50s, who buys and sells socks, jackets and other clothes. “With the ECLOF backing, our business continues to grow.”
Currently operating in 30 developing countries, including the Philippines, ECLOF is an ecumenical organization begun in 1946 in Switzerland through the initiative of visionary church leaders with the support of Christian bankers. It has a special alliance with the Geneva-based World Council of Churches and Netherlands-based Oikocredit.
Due to good business, Baliang and her husband managed to send their five children to school. The eldest graduated from a course in criminology in April, which Baliang says is testimony to “God’s goodness”.
Peter Dao-ines, 55, a farmer who cultivates strawberries has a similar opinion of the church-backed financing service.
“Through the loans, we were not only able to pay our land rentals, and improve our business, we were also able to pay our tithes in our church,” he says. “So, I also thank the Lord for ECLOF.” For his strawberry growing business, Dao-ines rents about 2500 square meters of land from the Benguet State University.
“We used to borrow from private moneylenders who would charge us usurious interests. But we are now grateful for having found Eclof,” notes Gloria Pagoy, aged 58, who cultivates flowers. These are in big demand on All Saints Day (1 November), Valentines Day, Christmas, and during the traditional wedding months from April to June. “With ECLOF’s low interest, we recover our investments and even get modest earnings.”
Before she discovered ECLOF in 2003, Pagoy had four greenhouses that she was able to build up over a number of years. With the loans from ECLOF, Pagoy was able to immediately build another greenhouse.
“Since Eclof is a good finance backer, I always tell members of my group to stay credible and be prompt in repaying our loans,” says Pagoy.
Baliang, Dao-ines, and Pagoy are among 1,450 borrowers from Eclof Philippines’ Benguet branch in the north of the southeast Asian country. Most of them have success stories and experiences of faith to recount. Eclof-Philippines has thousands of other clients in other parts of the country, most of them small entrepreneurs and farmers.
ECLOF clients interviewed by Ecumenical News International concurred that their loans, at 2.5 per cent interest plus rebates, are more affordable and accessible than commercial bank lending and loans from private moneylenders. The minimum loan commercial banks offer is 1 million pesos (19,150 US dollars), which small entrepreneurs and farmers cannot afford. Eclof, on the other hand, lends amounts as small as 5,000 pesos (96 dollars) to as high as 300,000 pesos.
Clients also say they appreciate the capacity-building training provided through ECLOF. Pagoy cites courses on how to manage a business and basic cash recording, and another on Christian leadership and stewardship, which ECLOF clients completed in April. “This training is not given when you loan from a bank or from a private money lender,” she said.
In explaining the “fair-credit-to-promote-human-development” goal of ECLOF, its international director Muhungi F. Kanyoro declared: “Our clients must succeed in improving their lives through the loans ECLOF extends; otherwise, we fail. The measure of our success is not just the repayment rates of loans but the positive impact of the loans on the lives of the clients.”
Kanyoro was in the Philippines along with directors and staff from other countries during April. One of their tasks was to assess how ECLOF has fared since it was established 50 years ago.
See here for more information about the Ecumenical Church Loan Fund.
[With acknowledgements to ENI. Ecumenical News International is jointly sponsored by the World Council of Churches, the Lutheran World Federation, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, and the Conference of European Churches.]