Bangladesh: To the villages and back

Assalamalaikum!

I’m back from a four day village trip to a few villages in the Rajshahi district. The purpose of this visit was to oversee some of the Grameen operations. We attended center meetings where all the groups assembled on a weekly basis to discuss their progress, repay their installments or submit new loan proposals. Each group consists of 5-10 women of similar age and background (they can’t be blood relatives however). This idea of group borrowing where the onus of repayment lies with the group and not only the individual has proven to increase social capital, allowing Grameen to maintain repayment rates of almost 98%. As interns, we asked the borrowers several questions to gauge the true performance of micro-credit and provide recommendations, if any. The whole process led to some interesting findings and ideas.

We left for Rajshahi early Sunday morning by van, and took about 6 hours to get there. Here’s what we figured out on the ride; South Asians get some kind of thrill out of cutting corners, and Bangladeshis more so. You see them cutting corners at the grocery store, giving you a little less than what you paid for, at restaurants, at home and even on the road. Our driver (who was either an exceptionally good driver or a really really terrible one, depending on how you look at it) got us almost killed at least five times every half hour. The gods must love us. We were driving on what should have been a one-way that the Bangladeshis had conveniently converted to a four lane street, with vehicles moving in both directions. I think we were going at least 90 km/hr. On the highways, our driver would wriggle his way between two heavy duty trucks, still at 90. “Driver sahab, tomhar gaadi rickshaw naa!” (“Driver sir, you’re van isn’t a rickshaw!”), we tried gently reminding him in our very broken Bangla. We had big buses coming right at us every five minutes, and our driver would swerve when the bus was only inches away. Anyway, in retrospect, the whole thing was a fun (minus our many whiplashes) rollercoaster ride that Disney would charge a lot for.

The village was extremely hot, with temperatures hitting almost 40 degree Celsius (104 Fahrenheit). We were living with the branch manager of Bagha and his family (he had 3 young daughters, two of the younger ones were 9 yr old twins.  When we weren’t working, I spent time with them playing Ludo and Snakes & Ladders. Fun!) The village had more frequent power cuts than Dhaka, which is saying a lot. We didn’t have electricity for almost 8-9 hours a day and even when we did, the fans just circulated hot air. The minute the lights went out, even more insects and other animals came out, in addition to some of the bolder ones that just lived among us in broad daylight. Now I’ve promised myself that I wouldn’t dedicate a significant part of this post to relatively insignificant issues, but think lizards, giant roaches (a major upgrade from the Dhaka ones), frogs, wasps, fireflies (which were really cool, actually!), mosquitoes and other bugs I could not identify.

Anyway, we had bigger fish to fry. Our mornings began at 7 am. We attended a few center meetings and spent time with the borrowers asking them about their Grameen experience and life in general. The thing to remember is that there are economic classes even within a village. So there were some borrowers who were “struggling members” (as Grameen defines it), who are basically beggars in the village and don’t have much of a house. There are other borrowers who live in sturdy houses made of mud and clay with a tin roof that can withstand floods, and other borrowers that live in weaker houses made of straw and bamboo.

I’ve listed some of the questions below that we asked the borrowers, with their relevance where necessary, followed by the answers we received.

1) What kind of business do you have?- Many of them had a variety of businesses to spread their risks. Grameen borrowers have to adopt 16 decisions in order to become a member. One of these decisions dictates that every borrower should grow their own vegetables to eat, and to sell the surplus. This is an important decision leading to self-sufficiency. Many borrowers have pumpkin patches around their house, or grow other kinds of vegetables on their roof. They (most of them) grow seasonal vegetables and fruits all year round and only buy rice or spices from the local market. Besides this, there were a range of other businesses ranging from handicrafts to poultry farming.

2) What kind of loan have you taken from Grameen for this? (Grameen has several kinds of loans ranging from basic loans to pay for daily activities to micro-enterprise loans for bigger business ideas.). Some of the borrowers take loans of behalf of their husbands (since only women can be Grameen members) and work with them jointly. This has increased their status within their family too.

3) Who is your main customer?- We asked this because many of them had similar businesses, like mango growing for example. Living so close to each other this competition would eventually ruin one of their businesses. However, we found out that for mangoes and other fruits for example, their buyers were wholesalers located in the nearest town.

4) What were you doing before you got the loan?- Most of them didn’t do anything and claimed that the loan truly empowered them. Some of them used to work with their husbands in the fields or help them with their businesses.

5) Are you taking any other kind of loan from Grameen?- As mentioned previously, Grameen offers several different kinds of loans. A lot of them had taken basic loans and micro-enterprise loans. Some of the older centers had borrowers taking housing loans to rebuild their homes. Again, one of the 16 decisions stipulates that members should try and rebuild their houses and not live in dilapidated homes. This is important for a place like Bangladesh that floods easily and experiences heavy monsoons.

6) Have you had trouble paying back your installments?- Most of them said no, since their group encouraged and helped them out, pointing to the social capital I mentioned earlier. But we had some issues with this which I’ll discuss later.

Here’s a few pictures of some of the members and their life.

One of the borrowers showing us her means of livelihood-knitting and sewing of blankets and other textiles.

Simon on what was our means of inter and intra village travel. A tricycle with a wooden plank at the back that carries anything from people to vegetable baskets. Zero carbon!

This woman lost her husband 20 years ago. She has 2 children. With the help of Grameen, she has taken several loans. She now runs 3 successful business by herself (including mangoes and poultry). She has taken an educational loan for her older daughter to see her through college and is able to pay for her son's education with her own savings. She even took a housing loan to rebuild her house. In the words of Gwen Stefani, that probably doesn't amount to much but anyway, she ain't no hollaback girl!

A borrower making her weekly repayment.

We also spoke to a struggling member and heard her heart-wrenching story. She was 75 years old and was a full-time beggar. With a Grameen loan, she bought a few goats and ducks and sold their milk and eggs, no longer as dependent on begging. Her two sons lived a few houses from her but took no care of her. There were days when she would go hungry but her sons refused to help her. There were days when they beat her up and forced her to give up her house, saying they’d help her if she gave them her property. Now there are probably thousands of others in the same plight but just seeing her standing there, crying as she told us this was more than any of us could handle. I hugged her, tearing a little myself, and gave her 50 taka knowing full well that nothing I did would make a dent of a difference to her plight.

On the subject of microfinance and Grameen, we had several issues that need another post altogether (which I will write very soon!). With the rest of the world jumping on the microfinance bandwagon, it’s necessary to maintain some amount of skepticism. However, it’s ironic that in the backdrop of a global credit crisis, credit is a prayer answered for millions in Bangladesh and other poverty-stricken countries. (Simon, if you’re reading this, I’m going to give you full “credit” for that! )

Advertisement