Micro Finance, MIFOS, and Dadamac Goes Glocal November 6, 2010

Hi Comfort,

It was great to get your exciting updates on micro-finance as part of our Dadamac Goes Glocal discussions on Dadamac Day. I am copying this to Chris Macrae and his team.

Excerpts from Dadamac Day archive relating to microfinance are copied at the end of these notes

What next?

Nikki will blog of course ( http://www.dadamac.net/blog/nikki ) but we need to share more details than that.

Ideally we need to pull the information together in a better way for “outsiders” to read. I suggest we set up a new “project page” about MIFOS.

Setting up a MIFOS project page

Andy has done clever stuff for us for project pages. Each time we collect (or update) information for a project it will be easy to get it showing up in the right place. We simply write what we know under some suggested headings. The magic is that we don't need to write under every heading (in fact it is probably best if we don't fill them all in). Just choose the headings that seem appropriate for theproject in hand and write what you want to. A couple of sentences will do (a paragraph or more if you want).

Once there is enough information to share with an outsider we'll publish the project page (and it can go straight to the front page of the website). Let's discuss this at the Wednesday meeting.

Meanwhile, here is some information we can share from Dadamac Day about Micro Finance - cut and pasted from the skype archive.

Micro Finance and "Dadamac Goes Glocal" (I have added some links and explanations of acronyms)

[09:07:23] John Dada: It is amazing how quickly six years have passed by, but we do have a lot to show for those years! At six, I think we have made some progress, do you agree?
[09:08:54] Kazanka Comfort: Yes
[09:13:36] Pamela: Yes Comfort - we need to share more of latest MF (Micro Finance) developments
[09:13:58] Kazanka Comfort: And the various national and international awards we've received is another step
[09:14:57] John Dada: And now we will be looking at the local situation and then seeing how through the Zittnet connection and the KRC (Knowledge Resource Centre), Dadamac can connect local initiatives and vision with the global community
[09:14:59] Kazanka Comfort: Woo! Pam am exciting sharing on MF, especially on Mifos the software we are using to enter our data
[09:16:16] Pamela: I contacted Chris Macre yesterday after our meeting to tell him that MF was firmly on Dadamac agenda and I would be sending him more news
[09:16:38] Pamela: he has already circulated Nikkis' blog about Gayl http://www.dadamac.net/blog/20101019/gayls-star
[09:17:23] Pamela: the man who helps to organise Mohammed Yunus' visits to London
[09:19:12] John Dada: Having people like Chis Macrae blogging about the Fantsuam activities can only be good news
[09:19:18] Kazanka Comfort: We are the first organization in Nigeria using Mifos
[09:21:08] Frances Dada: Mifos seems to have been a big step forward. Is that the system Gayle helped with?
[09:22:19] Kazanka Comfort: Yes that is what Gayl is doing now, helping to see that all the MF data is  on this softare
[09:23:34] John Dada: That is great news from Chris
[09:24:38] John Dada: Our field officers, some who had never used a computer before joining FF (Fansuam Foundation), are now tracking their microfinance clients on the MIFOS, its an amazing trabsformation to hear them explain how MIFOS works
[09:33:06] John Dada: KRC will house our microfinance MIFOS, Dokeos for the Aademy
[09:47:21] Kazanka Comfort: with Mifos we expect to become a resource to other MFI institutions who wished to be trained
[09:48:31] John Dada: As pioneers in the use of MIFOS, FF field officers will become trainers for other microfinance organizations in Nigeria
[09:48:49] Kazanka Comfort: NGOs (non-government organsations) and CBOs (community based organsiations) who are doing microcredit, who are our partners
[09:48:51] Pamela: and please remind me - when you do MF is it a group of one person and four friends or is it four altogether
[09:49:28] John Dada: Small groups of 5 persons, and also individual loans are available
[09:49:37] Frances Dada: That's excellent abut the field officers passing on their skills in MIFOS and raising the profile of FF microfinanace
[09:49:47] Kazanka Comfort: Yes I think the training Gayl is giving field officers now is to prepare them for the future
[09:50:27] Cholly22: MIFOS has not been a stepping stone for the Microfinance department only but for ZittNet too
( http://www.dadamac.net/projects/business-sme-livelihoods/zittnet-rural-connectivity-ongoing )
[09:50:53] Cholly22: The techie aspect is also serving as a building block for us in ZittNet
[09:51:49] John Dada: ZittNet's work with Microfinance shows the integrated nature of FF programs
[09:52:05] Cholly22: The server is presently located in ZittNet and it does not Just have MIFOS installed on it
[09:52:11] John Dada: I am also encouraging the Acaemy to introduce students to MIFOS with Field officers doing the training
[09:52:44] Frances Dada: So the field officer role is changing and developing
[09:53:02] Kazanka Comfort: MF ties to other activities in FF is how it makes loan available to run projects effectively
[09:54:55] john iruaga: whenstudents are trained on how to use mifos it will no doubt increase thier opportunity of securing a job in the labour market
[09:55:00] John Dada: The beauty of it is in the way the various programs compliment each other: ZittNet helping MF to help Academy and Clinic......
Academy to manage course content and course delivery.
[11:13:20] Kelechi B.G. Micheals: and we are on the Map of Grammeen . with MIFOS implementation on the way.
[11:13:34] Kelechi B.G. Micheals: this is for the MFI service we provide at ff.
[11:14:06] Kelechi B.G. Micheals: http://mifos.org/node/378

More about Fantsuam Foundation and its micro-credit work

There is a 5 minute video about Fantsuam Foundation, where Comfort talks about microfinance for about a minute (after John has done the introduction)

For more about the Dadamac - Fantsuam Foundation relationship see http://www.dadamac.net/partners/fantsuam-foundation

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