Small Loans Big Impact - Mali

Microfinance schemes, which offer development loans to the poor, have enabled millions to turn their lives around. We report on how they've helped one village in Mali.

Eight years ago, development workers arrived at the remote village of Yebe. "They didn't give us any money but they explained how to build up a co-operative bank", states the village elder. With a loan of only 30 euros, Mama Coulibaly was able to buy a sack of corn which she sold at a profit. "I was able to pay back the money very quickly and I got another loan. My business developed in this way". Today she runs a small shop and is the only person in her village to have a television. As another villager sates; "This bank has opened up opportunities for us which were unthinkable eight years ago".

January 2007
ALTEMEIER & HORNUNG FILMPRODUKTION
Distributed by Journeyman Pictures

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News & Politics

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• Microfinance
• Schemes
• Bank
• Money
• Poor
• Development
• Mali
• Yebe
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[tikogal01]

what a difference between the attitudes of Mama and Yakuba...Mama is self-reliant and has worked hard to build up her business while raising her family , Yakuba on the other hand relies on hand-outs from his sons and does not seem to attempt to actually work....Mama is right when she says "to help women is to help everyone" because they do most of the hard work. Go Mama go!!!

[Valdris1987]

let this sistem go down, stop this madness-

[soninkeremme]

didi you say babmaras once ruled west africa?, where did you read that?, I think you need to revisit your history books.

[bbjagaa]

Keep doing your good job mama!

[ulongkoror]

@RevyNai

awwwww did you get your feelings hurt?am i sorry,should i call a whambulance for you?

[RevyNai]

@ulongkoror You..... Are so ignorant. You dont even deserve any more of my effort than that. Good bye.

[arsenalongao]

@ulongkoror you cant just view the world as being so black and white. colonization created a path dependence that restricted Africa's full growth. there is no doubt in my mind - and in the minds of policitcal scientists all over the world - that if Africa hadnt been so ravaged by colonization it would be far better off than it is now. perhaps not as advanced as the west, but certainly less countries would be considered to be third-world. and i dont understand this argument about just taking it

[ulongkoror]

@arsenalongao

well sorry i dont know the dates that well lol,didnt learn those parts with so much details in history class

but my point is that africa was colonized hundreds of years ago right?and chinese were invaded and conquered by mongols and manshu 100s of years ago too.so why is it that china can fight their way out everytime they are in a hole,and africans just sit there and let it all happen?

i just dont think africans have that drive to achieve greatness,AKA,lazy

[arsenalongao]

@ulongkoror .....is simply ilogical

[arsenalongao]

@ulongkoror if anything that proves my point that China was never colonized. throughout the 1910s China was going through a series of revolutions that would from the modern day Republic of China. The Opium Wars occurred between 1839 and 1860. the fact that only Hong Kong was taken by the British further proves that China was never fully colonized. and though i agree that the Japanese atrocity in China was unforgivable, to use it as an argument that somehow it makes Africans lazy in comparison