Microfinance clients are often courageous women: mothers, and sometimes grandmothers, who want to provide a better life for their families; better than the one that they have known. In some cases, however, it is the ambition and drive of a young adult that is able to raise a family above the poverty line. Through our support of microfinance institutions around the world, Grameen Foundation support the efforts of women at all stages of life. Read below to see how one young woman is helping develop new opportunities for her family in war-torn East Timor.
At the age of 19, Mariana Fernandes is the primary earner for her family of five, including her parents, and a younger brother and sister.
After "the war," which is how Timorese describe the Indonesian-backed militia violence that engulfed the young nation after it voted for independence in 1999, her family came out of hiding in the mountains and found their house burned and all their animals and tools taken.
Like their neighbors, they rebuilt a tiny house using zinc sheets donated by World Vision and bamboo from the surrounding forests. They began farming again by planting corn, beans and root crops that are the main food supply in the mountain valley.
The family has always been poor subsistence farmers and their eldest daughter had only three years of schooling. But Mariana wanted to become a trader. With the small amount of money they still had after the war, she bought thread and made tais (a woven cloth worn on formal occasions).
"I followed my friend Juliana on her trade route, and then, when she went to Dili, I continued on my own. I had hardly any capital - around $10 from selling the tais - but I bought and sold kerosene and thread."
A few months later, Mariana joined Moris Rasik, a local microfinance institution and a partner of Grameen Foundation, and took a loan of $100. She paid this off in six months, after purchasing one pig and saving $20. She took a second loan of $180, which earned her a $50 profit, and is now on her third loan. She now has the capital necessary to begin a serious trading business.
Her "trade route," even by East Timor standards, is remarkable. "On Monday I sell kerosene at Ulu Krau. On Tuesday I go to the border [with Indonesia] and sell potatoes, onions and peanuts and buy more kerosene and cigarettes. On Wednesday I go to Atsabe and sell them. On Thursday I stay for the center meeting and on Friday I go to Suai and buy sopi (a local alcohol). On Saturday I sell the sopi in Atsabe. On Sunday I weave tais."
Mariana states all this quite matter-of-factly. But she is describing a series of arduous journeys. From her village to the border is nearly three hours, one way, going west. Atsabe is another two hours north. Suai is three hours away on the southern coast. She makes a point to sleep at home every night. The 'public transport' she uses involves standing on the back of a wheezing pickup, or cramming into a minivan over unpaved, precipitous mountain roads.
Mariana lives in the mountainous Bobonaro sub-district, where the soil is inadequate to raise most crops. Families who reside there typically take up trading in order to buy additional food. The population of Timor Leste lives in scattered pockets, and as a result, extensive trading routes, like Mariana's, are not unusual.
"I like taking credit, because I like doing business," Mariana says with a wide smile. "In another two loan cycles, our family will be out of poverty."
To learn more about this author, visit Grameen Foundation's Website.
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