Community Development

From the confines of a tiny tea stall, Shamsuddin long dreamed of setting up something bigger; a corner grocery shop to provide more security for the future of his disabled child, Rabuil, and to fund a move away from the slum dwelling without electricity in which he and his family of six lived in. But he never managed to get very far due to lack of available finance. Children’s Hope, who had provided nutrition, healthcare and other assistance to Rabuil in the past, awarded him a further grant of US$257 (£210) towards his total investment, which has at last enabled him to set up the shop. Soon his business started to generate the extra cash needed to relocate his family to more secure accommodation, where there is more room and the roof doesn’t leak in the monsoon.

After her husband’s death in 2007, Kulsum became the sole bread-winner for her family of four, which included Sumi Akter, then 12, who was sponsored by Children’s Hope. Kulsum set up a home-based business with the help of a micro credit loan. Initially, she bought sewing equipment with that money and later took further loans totalling US$1292 (£1050) to boost her business. Today, Kulsum’s business is well settled and enables her to meet all of her essential family needs. Her daughter Sumi graduated last year.

Nurul Islam makes his living as a driver of a three-wheeled taxi, known as a TucTuc. Wanting to provide a more secure future for his seven-strong family he took the risk of taking out a high interest loan from another source to buy a reconditioned taxi, but the interest payments were too high. This was where Children’s Hope came to the rescue. He decided to take a loan from the charity’s microcredit scheme, which repaid his high interest loan and enabled him to manage his family finances with a low interest micro credit loan.

With the help of her husband, Rahima has run her corner tea stall since 2008. While Children’s Hope funded the education costs of her youngest daughter, Tahmina, then 11, now 18, she was struggling to find the money needed for her other two daughters, Nasnina and Sonia Akter, now aged 22 and 25.  She took out her first micro-credit loan in 2009 and invested the money in her business to help generate the extra income required for school fees. Soon she was getting a good return, and she repaid all of her loan in time and secured a second loan for further investment. Today Rahima comfortably manages all her household expenses, including the costs of university education for two of her daughters and paying for accommodation for the rest of the family.

Nazma is a mother of three, after seperating from her husband, she became the sole bread-winner of the family. Her days were very burdensome and whatever she managed to earn as a laborer in a tailor shop was not enough to meet her family needs. So hard was the struggle that she had to take her children out of school. Children’s Hope were able to fund the further education of her son Omar, as well as providing nutrition and family healthcare. To allow Nazma to start saving for the future Children’s Hope awarded her with a non-refundable grant of US$385 to establish her own tailoring shop. Now with the extra income she can support the education of her other children as well as contributing to the accommodation costs of relatives