Meet Rabaya

Rabaya – Microfinance Borrower – Afghanistan

Like most female children, Rabaya was forced to leave school at an early age.

In her early 40s, living in the suburbs of Kabul with six children and with a husband incapable of working, the family became fully dependent on the income of her two young sons. She found it hard to cope and to meet the basic needs of her family who were now forced to live under harsh economic conditions with no hope of escape. Rabaya started to search for an alternative source of income. She knew that the local BRAC office offered loans to poor women to enable them to engage in viable income generating activities and could see the joy on the faces of the loan beneficiaries.

The loans were the hope of escape from poverty and Rabaya had made her mind up. She joined as an active member of her nearest village organization and took an initial loan of 30,000 Afghani. She bought clothes, thread and other necessary materials for manufacturing couches and sold the couches in the local market with the help of her two young sons.

Now, at the age of 45, Rabaya is able to meet the needs of her family and has been able to keep her children in school. She is very happy and grateful to BRAC and deeply believes that these types of loans can play a crucial role in the development of the local community and for poverty alleviation, especially for women.