Access to credit for poor women : a scale-up study of projects carried out by Freedom from Hunger in Mali and Ghana

What is more, FFH has expanded FINCA"s "credit only" model by adding a hunger-prevention education component. The projects in both countries have been successful in increasing rural women"s income and self-confidence and in improving the health and nutritional status of pre-school children. However, the changes in Mali are consistently higher than in Ghana. In Mali, the project has reached 38 associations with 916 members in the Dogo region. Loan payment is currently 95%. In Ghana, 16 credit associations have been organized with 444 women borrowers. While the project initially functioned well, by June 1991, repayment had declined to a critical level, and FFH eventually decided to phase out the project. These differences can be explained by the way the projects were implemented in the two countries. In Mali, the loan package that was intended for trade was used for trade, the loan size was appropriate for the experience and skills of the borrowers, and the borrowers" groups and the associations managed their fund conservatively and with close attention to the quality of the records kept. By contrast, in Ghana, the loan package that was intended for trade was used for agriculture, the loan size was too large relative to the previous experience of the borrowers, the associations lost control of the management of their internal loans, and recordkeeping was poor.