Credit union foundation supports African women
Howard Lake | 19 March 2007 | News
Irish credit unions are providing ‚€100,000 this year to support a charity that helps Ethiopian women living in poverty to become self-sufficient. The Credit Union Foundation announced last week that it was providing the money to Self Help, an Irish development agency that helps people in eastern Africa.
Self Help will use the money to develop cooperatives in Ethiopia that allow local women to save and borrow money. Self Help runs about 75 cooperatives in Ethiopia with over 9,000 members.
”The cooperatives allow poor women to access credit, said George Jacob, communications manager with Self Help.
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The Foundation was established by the Irish League of Credit Unions. The main source of funding is contributions from the member credit unions, supplemented in some cases by co-funding from donor agencies.
The objective is to relieve poverty in developing countries by supporting credit unions, their representative bodies and other cooperative type organisations through the provision of financial and technical assistance.
Jacob said that one of the most popular ways for local women to raise money in Ethiopia was to buy and rear a calf, which was then sold for a profit.
”The money raised allows them to do this. It can also help women to have enough money to grow cabbages and alternative crops, or to set up a small shop that sells eggs and other goods.”
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.