Sangimoh Safarova was authorized for a $200 loan from Mercy Corps that was used to purchase potatoes to seed this field the in eastern Talikistan town of Tavildara. Photo Credit: Jason Sangster for Mercy Corps

Even at the venerable age of 54, Sangimoh Safarova doesn't shy away from hard physical labor. Hoe in hand, this spry woman eagerly scrapes eastern Tajikistan's rocky soil to dig up the last of her bumper potato crop.

If Safarova has an extra spring in her step these days, it may be because she recently fed her enterprising spirit with a $200 loan from Mercy Corps. With it, she tripled her potato yield and upped the productivity of three other vegetable plots. Now, with the prospects of additional credit, she's entertained thoughts of launching family enterprises that
don't involve scraping topsoil.

Scraping by aptly describes how most residents survive in this steep, rocky valley. Surrounded by some of the world's most rugged topography, Tavildara is cut off from the rest of the country both by purplish mountains and by political tensions that linger from Tajikistan's 1992-1997 civil war.

After two years, it's not a stretch to say the Mercy Corps-initiated program has touched the lives of nearly each of the 15,000 people who live in this valley.

Tavildara's picturesque mountain landscape then doubled as a stronghold for rebel forces. To root out the opposition, government tanks and warplanes shredded roads, buildings and most other infrastructure. At one point, the valley's main 4,000-person town emptied of all but children and elderly, according to news accounts. Even after the hostilities ended, heavily mined mountain passes kept Tavildara effectively sequestered from the rest of Tajikistan for years.

"My house served as a base for government soldiers for 12 days," says Safarova. "All the men ran away. There were no goods available — soap, shoes, everything you needed to live. We collected bullets from sniper rifles in the yard. There are places you can still see the bullet marks."

Today, bullet marks notwithstanding, the area is largely rebuilt physically, but remains politically, culturally and geographically isolated. It is a place apart, virtually frozen in time. Mercy Corps is helping residents move their lives peacefully forward.

Beginning in October 2004, the agency has spearheaded a wide array of projects - with financial support from USAID - aimed at improving the quality of life and reducing the potential for renewed conflict. We've partnered with communities to build better irrigation channels, a new market bazaar and several soccer and volleyball fields; organized youth camps and sports tournaments; loaned money to groups of women entrepreneurs; and distributed loads of sportswear and equipment donated by Nike.

We also built a computer-equipped resource center in the middle of town, where local officials recently held the town's first-ever public budget meeting to build trust between the government and the governed. After two years, it's not a stretch to say the program has touched the lives of nearly each of the 15,000 people who live in this sparsely populated valley.

Disbursing small loans helps families add livestock, purchase seeds or fertilizer, or start or expand a modest business.

Disbursing small loans is one of the program's most forward-thinking components. The money helps families add livestock, purchase seeds or fertilizer, or start or expand a modest business. Roughly half of the current loan recipients are women. The two female credit officers with Borshud, a Mercy Corps-sponsored microfinance institution that is now the country's third largest, credit the loans with spurring employment and challenging widely held gender beliefs.

"When the woman brings in money from work outside the home, for example, her husband can't order her around by saying, 'I'm feeding you,'" says Kholbi Saidova, a 28-year-old Borshud loan officer. "Because of what we're doing, the economic level of the community is rising, and the mentality is changing, too."

Sangimoh's husband, who works in the local irrigation department, feared she wouldn't be able to pay back the $200 she borrowed. With $100, she purchased seven bags of potato seeds. With the other half, she bought fertilizer to sprinkle on her wheat, carrot and cabbage seeds.

With the seeds, her potato fields yielded three times their normal bounty. If she manages to sell all of them, she'll pocket $260. She also saved at least $10 on wheat she didn't have to buy because her fertilized fields produced more than usual. "My husband's salary is enough to buy socks," she says. "But all my children have gone to university. These fields helped pay their way."

One of her sons, 20-year-old Ismail, raises bees when he's not at school. He'd like his mom to open a gas station on the road that leads to Dushanbe, Tajikistan's capital. She enjoys considering the possibility, but demurs. "Potatoes are enough for me. But I'm happy other women have these chances and opportunities."




Contributed by Dan Sadowsky, Senior Web Writer for Mercy Corps.

To read another Global Envision article about the effectiveness of microfinance, see A Second Look at Microfinance.



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