Success of the Month - February 2008

Selina Togodui
[Ghana - Accra - Nima]

My name is Selina Togodui. I’m 39 years old. I live with my husband and our four children in the Nima district of Accra.

For several years now, I have held a food stall. At the beginning, I only cooked and sold fufu* and banku* underneath a few boards, no walls. It was very difficult to cook in this open space during the rainy season. It was so hard to light the fire and keep it going ! At the same time, I had drawn a loyal clientele who loved my cooking and encouraged me to offer more dishes. In 2005, I felt I was ready to develop my business... I felt able, but I didn’t have the necessary capital!

Fortunately, a neighbour of mine happened to tell me about ID-Ghana (EdM’s on-site partner); she encouraged me to apply. I went, I defended my business development project, and the team believed in me! I received an initial loan of 1 million cedis (70 €) in September 2005, followed by 6 other loans as I continued to develop my business.

Now I cook and sell all kinds of dishes! And I’m sheltered from the rain! I used perpend stone to build a room and a kitchen, and I bought tables and chairs for customers. What’s more, I equipped my cuisine with gas rather than wood: more economical, more ecologically sound, and much more practical! Now my food stall feels more like a little restaurant and I have 6 employees!

Best of all, thanks to the development of my business, of which I am very proud, I saved 13,926,000 cedis (977 €) with the help of ID Ghana and I can now afford to send my three eldest to good schools.

I recommend ID Ghana to micro-entrepreneurs in my neighbourhood every day. Thanks to ID Ghana, I got the funds I needed to invest in my business, set up a savings account, and benefited from great training sessions: business management and how to attract clients, as well as training on health and hygiene.

My only complaint: each time I made a request, the credit agent granted me a smaller loan than that which I had requested… But, well, I suppose that forced me to develop my business at a more stable rythm…