CHEER Projects - Strengthening Communities

Capacity and Asset Building

The No-Interest Revolving Loan Fund is designed to help disadvantaged families help themselves, using available resources and common knowledge to improve their living conditions. These families are not the "poorest of the poor" but those who have the capacity, creativity and determination to use economic and technical assistance to improve living conditions for their children and communities.

Working in collaboration with the Association for the Handicapped and Orphans of Thua Thien-Hue Province and the local committees since 1995, the project has expanded from 10 to hundreds of families from 25 villages in three districts of the province, including the A Luoi Valley. Loans of one million Vietnamese Dong (approximately $65-$85) enable a family to start up a small business. The borrowers repay the non-interest loan at the end of 12 or 18 months, allowing the next family in line to borrow money; to date, over 90% of the participants have repaid their loans on time.

A Very Small Deed

Fifty years later I can still see the Hoa Sim (or "Princess Flower" as it is known in the U.S.) of my childhood.  The first time I encountered the flower was when I followed my parents to take refuge in the Co Bi mountain range. This time I contemplated Hoa Sim at Binh Dien village near Hue last summer when I represented CHEER to present the first Non-Interest Revolving Loan to 24 impoverished families from Binh Dien Village, Huong Tra District.

Each family received a non-interest loan from CHEER in the amount of $100 to be used for family economic investment. The families will return the initial capital to CHEER after 18 months. This year, CHEER will expand its assistance to the nearby village of Phong Hoa, in Phong Dien District.

I heard from many people who live in Hue that a few decades ago the name "Binh Dien" had a frightening connotation; as a "new economic zone" it was the poorest area in Thua Thien Province. Now things have changed. Transportation is fairly easy. After crossing the Huong River on the ferry, a car can travel straight to the village. The main highway, which is being repaired, will eventually go all the way to A Luoi.

Guided by teacher Le Van Cau, his wife and a few local dignitaries, I went deep into the area, way off the main route. Two decades ago, Mr. Cau and his wife left the comfort of the city to share a hard life with the young students in Binh Dien, planting peppercorn trees on an acre of land. Mr. Cau knows almost all the poor families in the area.

Under the scorching sun of the mountainous summer, I gradually became accquainted with a few of the families who borrowed money last year. Most of them invested in domestic animals and were fairly successful. With an initial capital of $100 they were able to raise a few pigs and double their investment in about a year. Some families, using good techniques, were able to raise their pigs to over 1.8 tons and sell them for 1.8 million VND.

The families also were able to earn some income from their vegetable gardens or orchards. The sincere "thank you" uttered by the peasants confirmed the fact that CHEER's initial loans have truly helped them begin to escape their almost insurmountably difficult economic situations.

After the official visit, I accompanied Mr. Cau and his wife to their "new economic zone." Contemplating the source of the Huong River winding through the hills covered with peppercorn vines and eucalyptus trees, my heart sank as I thought of the hard work that teacher Cau and his people have invested over the past many years.

Now, the most difficult times seem to be a thing of the past, but the poverty still lingers.  It will take many minds and hearts to solve this predicament for Viet Nam. But through this one individual, I now know, as poet Cao Tan once wrote, "what to do for the rest of the last half of my life.

Ton That Chieu, M.D.

Doan Cu Family

Piglets

Dr. Ton That Chieu delivered the first no-interest revolving loans

The 17 Women of Lang Loi

The women of Loi Village

Mrs. Nguyen Thi Nhan of Loi Village

Lang Loi village in the central of Viet Nam has 142 families, a total of 668 residents. Among them are 17 single mothers with their children: Seventeen mothers, seventeen girls and seventeen boys. The mothers are 42 to 60 years old, their children 10 to 29. They live in this village in Vien Thanh District, Nghe An Province, a swath of land tucked between the Truong Son mountain range and the plains of Yen Thanh.

The women live in small huts and scrape together whatever they can from the arid land to feed their children. Once, years ago, in response to the call of the country these women devoted their youth to uphold the independence of the nation against foreign intervention. When peace was finally restored in 1975 they returned to the village, picking up the pieces after the war, each with the hope of rebuilding a normal life: A normal life they couldn't have as teenagers; a normal life they couldn't have as adults; and a normal life they wouldn't have as mothers.

The war consumed more than three million Vietnamese lives and left this remote village with no single men. As days became nights and summers moved unto autumns, the urge to be mothers pushed them to break the strict village tradition against having children out of wedlock. No one wanted to shelter them, even their relatives. One by one, seventeen single mothers carved out a piece of land at the edge of the village of Lang Loi. They formed a community of their own, destitute but sharing a simple dream: To raise healthy children and to give them education.

Only education can help the children escape poverty. One of the women, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Nhan said that every time they want to move ahead, poverty is the barrier to progress. "We want to make some money by raising pigs in order to send our children to school in the hope that education will change their lives," she explained. "But poverty seems to pull us back down every time...In order to get a loan from the government we have to pay interest and use our homes as collateral. We have to pay the debt on time. The interest rate charged by private lenders is prohibitive," she said, "60,000 VND monthly for a 1,000,000 VND loan! We can't afford it!"

In the winter of 2002, CHEER presented each of these 17 mothers with a bicycle. In the summer of 2003 your support provided all of them with no-interest loans. They were able to raise pigs and tend their vegetable gardens without fear of losing their homes, or repaying the loans for another 12 months.