How Cash Transfer beneficiaries amass wealth in Kwara through savings, cooperative practices

In Shao town, lives Comfort Obalowu, a 45-year-old widow, who owns and operates a cassava processing factory.

Obalowu, a mother of six children, lost her husband some years ago, the development that puts solitarily on her shoulders – parental responsibilities.

She has her factory in the heart of the town, where traders within and outside the community come to buy garri in their numbers.

Garri, the creamy granular flour is derived from processing of freshly harvested cassava, is a staple in the home of average Nigerians.

According to Obalowu, this business is lucrative enough, earning a living for her and the children.

Shao is relatively a big settlement in Moro Local Government Area of Kwara North Senatorial District. It is about 14 kilometres away from Ilorin, the capital city of Kwara, and 15 kilometres to Malete, site of the state’s only owned university.

Obalowu did not achieve this milestone by a magic. She started as a petty trader in garri business, before opportunity to expand smiled on her six years ago, courtesy of the funding window offered by the National Cash Transfer (NCT).

“I was into the business before the programme, but only used to buy the commodity in small quantity and resell to consumers at home. This was earning a little, and we used it to augment the feeding at home.

“But when my husband died, the proceeds were no longer enough to take care of the family. We could not afford many things again; feeding became difficult, not to talk of children’s school fees.

“This was the situation until 2016, when I was luckily selected a beneficiary of the cash transfer programme,” the woman said.

NCT is a Household Uplifting Programme (HUP) of the Federal Government; and a component of the National Social Safety Nets Project (NASSP), being supported by the World Bank, to provide financial support to targeted poor and vulnerable Nigerian households.

This support, Dr Aminah Yahaya, Head of the NCT Unit in Kwara, said was aimed to improving household consumption, increase utilisation of health and nutrition services, improve school enrolment and attendance.

According to her, NCT also aims to improve environmental sanitation and management, and encourage household financial and asset acquisition as well as to engage beneficiaries in sustainable livelihood.

“To achieve these, about 2 million poor and vulnerable households in the country receive N5,000 stipend each, every month. The stipend is, nonetheless, paid bimonthly of N10,000. Out of the 2 million beneficiaries nationally, 34,000 are from Kwara.”

Yahaya explained that the social investment programme was meant to respond to deficiencies in capacity and lack of investment in human capital, especially amongst the poorest citizens.

The Poverty Assessment Report of the World Bank, the number of poor Nigerians was projected to hit 95.1 million in 2022.

Apparently, the condition of Obalowu is similar to other beneficiaries of the programme in the state as many recounted their poor economic ordeals before they got enrolled for the intervention.

Beneficiaries were selected across the state and formed into savings and cooperative groups in their various communities, where they had opportunities to contribute and take loans at will.

Not too long a time, members began to access the facility to set up new businesses and expand the existing ones, as the case applied.

One of such cases is the cassava processing factory set up by Obalowu. With the additional funds, this widow now goes to farm and market to buy cassava for processing. This, she claimed, increased her means to earn, and invariably improve the family’s means of livelihood.

To ensure a sustainable livelihood with the pittance, Dr Olubukola Adeyemi, Livelihood Officer at the state unit of the NCT, said the beneficiaries were being encouraged to procure assets from the savings, so that from the assets, they could generate income too.

“In livelihood, we have different sets of economic activities they are encouraged to partake. They are divided into farming and non-farming activities.

“Farming activities are crops production, processing of crops and marketing while non-farming activities include tailoring, liquid soap making, weaving of basket and the likes.

“We encourage them to procure assets at least from these savings, and we have different types of savings – rotational savings, cumulative savings, and cooperative, where they take loans and return.

“Livelihood is like building a mindset of enterprise. Most of them are not doing business before, but since they started saving, they have been able to do one or two things,” the officer said.

Sharing her success story, another widow, Abigail Adeoye, 45, narrated how the programme led her family out of poverty.

Adeoye, a mother of three, said the start-up capital from the cooperative society she belongs, helped to improve her live and those of the children.

“N5,000 may be meagre; it is not about the money. Rather, it is about the savings culture. So far, I had an opportunity to access credit facility on four different times.

“Aside other businesses that I engage in, I purchased a grinder, with which I use to grind grains and pepper for the villagers at a cost. This is really helping to create multiple streams of income,” she said.

Khadijat Saheed, 44-year-old mother of seven, another beneficiary, enjoyed her benefit at Tafa Tafa village, Asa Local Government Area in Kwara Central District.

While confirming being a beneficiary of the CTS (Cash Transfer Scheme), Saheed said she drew fund from Ifesowopo cooperatives, to procure a grinder and a deeper freezer for commercial uses.

“This is in addition to my farming business. Through all these, I make money to support the education of my children and meet other family needs.

“It’s the third time I would obtain loan, and if the programme continues, I hope to further expand the businesses,” she enthused.

Saheed’s neighbour, Iyabo Isiaka, 50, also secured from the society, the money she used to stock the shop she had built two years before the opportunity of the programme smiled on her.

“We thank God for the opportunity. I built a shop two years before the programme, but I could not stock it.

“But after we were enrolled for the cash transfer, and began the cooperatives, I was offered the first loan; this gesture helped my plan. It’s this opportunity that accounts for my success story today.”

Besides individual businesses, NCT beneficiaries in the village have a group farm on a four-acre of land.

Malam Abubakar Abdulsalam, who manages the farm, said produce were shared among the members. The latest sharing, according to him, took place before the recent Ramadan fasting.

Testimony  of the success story is the same at Eleyin village, Isin Local Government Area of Kwara South, where NCT beneficiaries in the community joined their counterparts from Manasara, another neighbouring settlement to set up Owonikoko savings group.

Mr Oluwafemi Olajide, 37, is a member of the group, attained the status of a landlord, having built a personal house from savings.

“I have achieved a lot with this. I was used to manual labour for farming before, but I can now save towards farming.

“I easily get money for input and chemicals, as well as to hire implement for farm work. This is contrary to past experience when I would have to labour for other farmers as a means to live and fulfill other obligations.

“I am not only able to pay children’s school fees, I have also built a house with this practice.”

It’s being the same sweet experience with widow Funmilayo Olaoye, 46, who has been a tailor, but diversified to leather works with the help of the financial opportunity.

“I was a specialist in sewing of clothing materials. But when I began to receive the money, I add bags making to it. I buy leather to make travelling bags, women hand bags and school bags.

“I thank God for this. I become more popular with it. Those who know me as a tailor, now patronise me for bags. Many people contact me for school bags. This is one of the fortunes the programme has brought to my life personally.

“It is not everybody that sews cloth from me, but since I am the only one making bags here, it is helping me seriously.

“Since I do not have a plan to remarry or sleep around with men, I am able to pay children’s school fees with ease. This was a bit difficult in the past; same thing with feeding,” she testified.

The Eleyin group also operates a joint rental service with the chairs and a canopy they bought from its savings. The group has acquired a plot of land where it’s planning to build a shop for the services.

Financial Inclusion

Besides, the stories of wealth creation and building mindset of enterprise, cash transfer programme has led to a financial inclusion of more than two million poor and vulnerable Nigerians.

For instance, Dr Yahaya, the head of the project in Kwara, said over 90 per cent of the beneficiaries, through the programme, now owed bank accounts for the first time in their lives..

The World Bank reported in 2018 that at least 1.7 billion adults worldwide were still completely unbanked, with an estimated 400 million of them in Africa.

Of this African figure, 38.1 million of them are Nigerians.

Unbanked individuals lack access to basic financial services including loans, the ability to send and receive funds securely, and a safe means of saving money, access credit facilities to start and or expand businesses.

The NCT official recounted that “the beneficiaries we started with in 2016 never knew what we call cooperatives, but we were able to form them into groups of cooperative society and savings.

“Today, they know what savings is and they can tell you they have N2000, N3000 and even when somebody comes, they can also give.

“Prior to this time, the beneficiaries  could never boast of getting loan, but they can now. Most of the successes recorded in the programme today is as a result of loan they get, not from outside, but sourced within the cooperatives they formed and sourced within their business groups.

Challenges

In spite of the success stories, the beneficiaries say they are constrained by the recent inconsistency in the payment of stipends, leading to depletion in their savings.

“For some months now, we have not been able to meet up with our obligation of the bimonthly payment to our beneficiaries. It is a very big challenge and it has not been easy on our part as an implementer.

“But as you know, being a government, we should also expect bottlenecks here and there. It is not like the Federal Government just kept the money somewhere and goes for it anytime they need it.

“We pray that the situation will improve,” said the state head.

Speaking more on the challenge, the programme livelihood officer, Dr Adeyemi, noted that the erratic payment was affecting the savings as some of the beneficiaries had started sharing theirs.

Other major challenges, according to the programme officials, are lack of supports from the state and local government councils on logistics, forcing the officials to rely only on the little allowances from the government at the centre. (NAN)