In 2007 knockabout guitar-strummer, tour
guide and sometime barista Zulfikar (Fikar) could usually be found serving
guests at Bukittinggi’s Bedudal Café, a backpackers’ favorite in the West
Sumatra city.
Enter former public servant Peter Johnston,
seemingly just another footloose Australian trying to understand Indonesia. But
this encounter would change not just the two men’s lives but those of hundreds
of Indonesians.
Peter was no wide-eyed newbie. His
archipelagic wanderings began in 2004.
He’d formally studied the language in Yogyakarta. So when he harangued against inequalities it
was clear his concerns were not freshly found.
He figured the poor were forever shackled
to poverty without capital. In his homeland the state welfare system where he’d
worked as an administrator and social worker, helped with schemes to kick-start
people’s lives. But this was Indonesia where indifference to the plight of the
lowly was endemic in banks and government.
So how could the folks in the Lucky Country
next door help their less privileged neighbors without being patronizing? Click light bulb moment: Microcredit.
Great idea – but bars everywhere sweep up
grand schemes along with the fag ends and plastic trash come closing time.
Despite his scepticism Fikar kept his mind
open. Over three days and a few more coffees
the two men devised a small no-interest loan scheme to help poor entrepreneurs
start a business.
It would be called Bamboo because, Fikar
reasoned, the plant is strong, resistant, sustainable and multipurpose. His mother had even used it to make clothes
during the Japanese occupation of the 1940s.
But then, as usual, the Westerner left.
“I thought it would all be forgotten once
Peter moved on,” he said at a Bamboo board meeting in Bandung. The Australian members used their own money
to pay for travel and accommodation.
“In any case, I had no experience of
banking and the credit system – only its faults.” He’s involved in a long legal case fighting a
company that allegedly upped its interest rates without consultation.
What he did have was local knowledge and understanding
of the hand-to-mouth way the poor in Indonesia live and the pressures on family
budgets. A smart kid, the youngest of
ten children born in Bukittinggi, his ambition was to become a lawyer.
Reality hit: No money, no study. Plan B – use wits. He picked up English from the tourists,
rapidly became fluent and opened a guide business, Lite n’ Easy. When the haze
from burning forests drove overseas visitors away he learned how to fix
computers. It was a fickle life.
“I had zero capital and rented a
motorbike,” he said. “I was just stuck.”
His mother had raised him to beware of debt. “Better you don’t eat than borrow,” she’d
said, “avoid loan sharks.”
These are the high-interest unofficial
credit suppliers that cruise the meat and vegetable markets, They typically
charge Rp 200,000 (US $ 17) to lend Rp 1 million (US $ 83) over 40 days) keeping
small businesspeople afloat, or savaging them in a sea of debt - depending on
your economic philosophy.
For Fikar there was no ambiguity – but much
doubt about the chances of undermining a harsh lending system embedded in the
culture.
“I wanted to do something to help the poor
get out of their debt cycle,” he said. “There’s no leadership from the
government – it’s just about impossible for small people to get ahead.
“I’m a bit of a rebel and despise a
bureaucracy that seems to believe that if you can make it more difficult, then
why not? How can you fight an elephant?”
The answer came when Peter made good on his
promise with a draft for AUD $500 (Rp 5 million). Fikar, 40, was
astonished: “I told my friends to pinch
me."
“I lived near the market and regularly passed
a café that never had food on display after midday. I knew the owner and wondered how he could
live like that. So I asked what he’d do
with a no-interest loan.
“Of course he wanted to know who was behind
it. Why would Australians want to help when Indonesians refused?
“Eventually we lent him Rp 1.5 million (US
$125) which he spent on building stock.
Now he has a bigger shop and his wife has a sewing machine which she
uses to make money.”
So Bamboo Micro Credit was born. It’s now an independent secular foundation
taking donations from Australians and channelling these to borrowers through
Fikar in Bukittinggi and agents in Malang (East Java) and Bandung (West Java). Hundreds have been helped as the loans are
repaid and the money recirculated through new clients.
“We are all smart in Indonesia, we are not
buffaloes,” Fikar said. “We have so much potential but are being held back
because the banks don’t want to know anyone whose collar is not smooth.
“Not everyone is right for a BMC loan. They must have plans for a sustainable
business, so inevitably some people hate me, but I’m not going to be bothered
by their negative energy. We now charge an administration fee of ten per cent
but the loans remain interest free.
“We’ve lost a little – but more than 90 per
cent of borrowers repay. If they default
their friends and family won’t get loans in future, so there’s social pressure.
Yet we have to be tolerant and understand there are other demands on families’
budgets, like paying for weddings, funerals and Idul Fitri celebrations. Sometimes we have to accept a slow payer so
knowing the culture is important. Most applicants are women.
“I
urge people just to be honest and tell me if there are problems with
repayments. Misfortune can happen to us
all – but don’t hide from me. I’m not
Dracula.
“The Australian board doesn’t interfere and
I only consult Peter if there’s a tricky decision to make.
“Now I think I might get to university. Then I can really understand the law and use
that knowledge to protect the poor.”
The
Birdman of Bunulrejo
Even as a small boy Farit Hermansya was an
accomplished gunman.
Together with his mates and an air rifle
he’d travel to forests near Blitar in East Java and shoot every perching bird
within range.
“I killed hundreds,” he said. “The numbers are countless.”
Then one day he had an epiphany. He’d winged
a bird. It looked in the little one’s
eyes knowing it was about to die. There was a brief contact between two living
creatures. Instead of wringing the
bird’s neck he tried to save its life.
Farit failed, but at that moment he turned
from killer to conservationist and began breeding exotic birds, mainly little
finches and parakeets.
It’s a hobby gaining popularity as
Indonesians get more disposable income, with many coming to Farit’s home in the
Malang kampong of Bunulrejo. Not all
buyers had cages, so he reckoned business might prosper if he supplied both
bird and lodging.
His business plan called for Rp 5 million
(US$400) to buy wood and tools. But
where to find such a sum?
“I knew it was pointless going to the
banks,” he said. “They want security
like the certificate for my home or motorbike.
I have a friend who works as a debt collector – he warned me against
even trying.”
But a neighbor told him about a non-government
community development organization called Daya Pertiwi that also acted as a Bamboo
Microcredit agent.
Farit, 29, scaled back his plans by buying
tools second hand and scavenging timber.
He was given a ten month Rp 1 million (US$83) no interest loan which
he’s repaying at Rp 100,000 a month.
A big cage can cost Rp 170,000 (US$14) but
most average half that sum. The birds
are more expensive with orange colored plumage fetching Rp 650,000 (US$52).
“I don’t expect there’ll be a need to
borrow again once this loan is repaid,” said Farit. “I can expand with the extra money I’m now
earning. I tell every buyer not to kill.
I still feel guilty about the birds I’ve shot.”
Duncan Graham, a journalist and writer, lives in Malang East Java.
After several rejections of my request by the banks, I profited from a loan of money on a company of loan between serious and fast reliable individuals. I know a formidable lady, quite honest and serious of the name Mrs. Helena Stastna who introduced me to Carrol Loan Company which later granted me the loan of $50,000.00 that I must refund in 10 years duration. With loan interest of 3% and margin of (2) Months before the repayment. I testify that I received the money last week without protocols and directly into my bank account. More, here is the E-mail:{infoloanfirm8@gmail.com}
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