To Serve a Woman is to serve the Nation “Hakuna Mwingine Kama Mama”

The Watamu Sub-location Joint Women’s Group was started in 2007. Women saw the need to take action and wanted to instigate development in the community by starting small businesses, to help prevent poverty and dormancy in their families and to enable them to educate their children.

Importantly the women saw the importance of educating themselves in respect of family planning and HIV/AIDS awareness including practicing birth control methods. The aim is to ensure more women are educated in this way.

Orphans of family members and friends are taken in and educated at the expense of the group. Without this assistance, these unfortunate children would be allowed to roam the streets and fend for themselves. The group currently cares for 20 orphans.

The group is also aware of the importance of the environment and conservation. To this end they have started a tree planting initiative at the site of an old rubbish dump, the Timbo Taka.

The group is highly organised and each member originally contributed Ksh50/- to the group’s savings. This inspired local government officials who held a mini harambee with local councillors and raised KSh100,000/-. With this sum the members were able to open their own bank account, which was the key to their dream. This enabled them to control their own finances and each member was given a loan of KSh3,000/- to start small businesses of their choice. This proved to be a very successful enterprise and the loans were paid off in three months.

Members’ businesses include, grocery shops, tailoring, and cleaning. Through the success of these businesses, the weekly subscription was raised to Ksh100/- per week, and loans were given for KSh6,000/-.

The members have a vision of raising funds so that they can increase the loans to enable the expansion of the businesses. In this way the groups can achieve its objectives by self sustainability, rather than relying totally on donations.
The members have proven themselves to be responsible with finances and accounting. The current membership totals 60 and members have overcome several obstacles, yet remain inspired and positive by the progress that they are making in the current business ventures. The group has great hope for the future of community development.

Should you wish to find out more about, and support this highly motivated group, please contact us.