We are entering the 4^th month of the dry season. The dust is pervasive and persistent. We had a shortened cold season where we suffered through the frigid 70° nights and sunny 90° days. The temperatures have begun to rise with 80° nights and over 100° days. The heat will continually increase until the rains arrive in May.

           I’ve been continuing to work with entrepreneurs in the zone surrounding Garoua. I’m currently teaching 4 business courses to 4 different groups. I’m teaching 8 sessions per week. 

          What’s interesting in this round of classes is that I’m teaching business and accounting to the illiterate women living in the poorest neighborhoods and surrounding villages of Garoua. They speak only Fulfuldé, so I work through an interpreter. My Fulfuldé is terrible.

            I have 3 classes teaching the illiterate poor. I was asked to help by some Cameroonian religious groups – one Evangelical and the other Apostolic – to help their congregations increase their incomes. The women are tough, they are humble, and they are intelligent. It took me a couple of sessions to establish a connection and to break through the white man thing, then the hierarchical thing, and then the self-esteem thing. By the third session they were at ease, questioning and even challenging some of the things I was teaching. 

            The highlight was when 3 women cultivators challenged me on the need to keep records of their expenses and revenues. It’s all in their heads they told me, and so what was the point adding more work. The truth of the matter is that their memory is uncanny.   Without writing they have trained their memories to retain an immense amount of data. I told them if they were happy with the system they were using, then they should absolutely continue along that path. I’m just offering some ideas if they were finding that they were not being successful. I thoroughly enjoyed the fact that would challenge me. I felt that if nothing else, they had achieved enough comfort at the sessions to speak up and not just accept what some pompous white man was dishing out.  It was truly a highlight!!!

            In the fourth class, I’m teaching existing entrepreneurs through the Chamber of Commerce. In this class everyone reads, writes, counts, and is currently operating an enterprise. Education level is High School at best. Here I can really get into it. When I get into teaching how to track inventory or calculate price or develop a budget, watch out! I feel the spirit overwhelming me. Who cannot get excited about Accounting??? In French to boot!

I still do individual consultations including:

          A project to build a small production facility to convert corn into flour. The project is seeking financing and if approved would create 19 jobs. Creating jobs is my personal goal. I only understood job creation as an intellectual concept before I came here. Now it is very real to me. I worked with the Cameroonian entrepreneur – an agronomist who understands fully the process of transforming corn into flour – teaching him how to account for the production process, track expenses of work in process, account for waste, and price a by-product of the production process.

         Another project that is just getting started is Klishy - the local beef jerky. It’s excellent!!! I’ve been a client and loved the product so much I’ve become a consultant (Ha Ha). The owner asked me to help him create a project plan so he can get financing to expand his production, and build a facility so he can continue to produce during the rainy season. Currently the meat is sun-dried on “tables” before being seasoned and cooked. This is great except during the rainy season when production is either halted or reduced.

          I’ve been helping a woman entrepreneur to plan for the loan she may soon be receiving to increase her product offering of prêt a porter women’s clothes and cosmetics. I helped her with a cash flow plan that would turn the loan over 3 times before her first payment, and a budgeting plan that smoothed out her payments so it would not disrupt her operation. She actually made a few extra francs with interest received on her cash balances.

          I’m advising another Cameroonian to establish a Business Support Bureau that would train business people and aspiring entrepreneurs in launching micro-projects, acquiring the financing, and then managing the loan funds. Many businesses fail because there is no support for small and micro businesses after the initial launch. The Business Support Bureau would also do loan collection (for a fee) for the banks and other Micro-Finance institutions. While the Bureau is in the villages training and advising on business management, accounting, and technical issues, it would also collect periodic payments for the financial institutions. Traveling to and from villages is the largest expense. By combining the reasons to visit a village and sharing the cost we think we could improve service.

          There are other projects in process or in the pipeline, but I can feel the glassy eyes over the internet. But I did want to at least provide a sense for what I’m doing here, and why my postings are fewer and farther apart.  Work gets in the way.