Female hawkers to access loans through cooperatives

Female hawkers will soon become creditworthy after authorities advised them to join cooperatives in order to access financial services. The president of the national women council, Tengera Francessca, is buoyant that the effort to organise women street vendors into cooperatives and empower them is one way to enhance the business sector. “They work on the streets because they do not have knowledge to get out of there. We want to organise women who are in petty business to come together into cooperatives,” she said, adding that the council intends to support them access financing from microfinance institutions and commercial banks. The effort also seeks to group hawkers into organised businesses and curb illicit business practices within the city. Hundreds of street vendors, mainly women usually flock Kigali town during evening hours. Tengera told Business Times, yesterday, that the national women’s council in conjunction with Rwanda Cooperative Agency (RCA) will train more than 321 women vendors in Kigali on how to operate cooperatives. Audace Bimenyimana, in charge curriculum development in the capacity building unit at RCA said that women are able to earn a lot from their meagre capital if they come together in cooperatives. “By working together, these women have the advantage of earning a lot from their savings and build bigger businesses and they will be able to employ other people,” he said. The mayor Nyarugenge Solange Mukasonga said that the government has already prepared minimarkets in Kitega sector, Nyarugenge- Biryogo and Kimisigara where female hawkers will be allocated to carry out their businesses on an expansive basis. “We have started construction of two more selling points in Mageragere and Kanyinya. This will help many of these women to get a place,” she said, noting that the markets will help women to expand businesses after acquiring credit. Jeannine Udahemutse, one of the beneficiary hawkers said their capital and businesses would expand as members put together savings. “We did not know how important cooperatives are; we would have suffered all this way. Now that they are giving us markets, it will be easier for us to settle and conduct our business to look after our families,” she noted ecstatically. Ends

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Female hawkers to access loans through cooperatives