A total of 11.9m/- in loans had been issued by Dodoma regional government for special groups—women, youth and people with disabilities (PwDs) in seven district councils to help them to expand their businesses and improve investments.
Regional Administrative Secretary (RAS), Dr Fatma Mganga said when speaking at the National Economic Empowerment Council (NEEC)’s meeting to evaluate the implementation of the economic empowerment policy.
The forum also brought on board women entrepreneurs, people with disabilities and various development stakeholders.
He said the funds were disbursed to the groups in Bahi, Chamwino, Chemba, Dodoma city, Kondoa, Kondoa town, Kongwa and Mpwapwa councils.
She said 7,004,724,612/- was directed to women groups, 4,264,231,059/- went to youth groups and 652,795,298/- for PwDs groups.
Dr Mganga said a total of 12,427 women and 2,249 men have benefited from the funding.
She said women have shown great success in repaying loans at 43 percent, followed by people with disabilities at 35 per cent and young people at 28 per cent.
In addition, she said the assessment showed that the funds provided to the groups were directed to various projects including small scale poultry factories, sunflower oil processing, flour milling and food restaurants.
“These funds provided to women, PwDs and youth groups have also facilitated access to credit for groups that were previously not able to access funds in financial institutions,” she said.
Aziza Mumba, assistant RAS on economic sectors, said that despite the achievements of the loans, there is a challenge of lack of human resources in managing the issuance and repayment of loans.
She said there has been a challenge of shortage of financial resources and staff to accommodate a large number of loan applications.
To address these challenges, there is a need for each council to invent new sources of income so as to increase the amount of lending to entrepreneurial groups applying for credit.
Mumba, however, suggested the increase of training for entrepreneurs on value addition and linking them with market chains.
Tunnu Pinda, wife of former Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda called on the entrepreneurs to seek loans in institutions that provide low interest loans that will benefit them economically.
She said that the gender equality propped up by the government has greatly helped women to recognize their value and capacity to overcome vulnerability.
“Most women now live in decent housing, educate their children, focus on food security and all this comes from investment profits, in general we are good. Currently, 50 percent of women own bank accounts,” she said.
