Loan to an Albanian farmer changes course of history
“I was selling milk in the market one morning when the loan officer gave me a paper about loans. I did not know what it was about,” Thimi said recently in the sitting room of his modest Pojan commune home.
World Vision’s Korce branch office assessed the micro-enterprise development (MED) opportunities and needs in local communes. They learned that difficult weather and product dumping from neighboring countries had hit the local farmers hard and that many were struggling. The loan officers connected with future clients and got them trained before any credit was given.
“Without more irrigation I could not grow enough to take to the market to sell. I asked World Vision for money to buy a pump and then dug a new well. Thank God for the loan because with the drought this year, without the water we would have been in a bad way,” he said.
Across the room, Thimi’s daughter-in-law and three grand-children nodded in agreement. The children are thin and a visitor is surprised at their ages – they appear much younger than seven and four.
Thimi said his first priority was feeding his family but with the increased crop yield he began selling in the market. After making his loan re-payments each month he has enough left over to buy more food. He is also starting to add a new room to his house.
Excitedly, he showed the concrete block outline of his new addition. “It will be a modern toilet,” he proclaimed with a smile. No longer will the Pali family have to use an outhouse as countless family generations have done before.
The times are very hard in southeastern Albania. Pali quotes the prices he sells his vegetables for in the market -- they are lower than elsewhere in the country. World Vision beneficiaries in other parts of Albania receive much higher prices for tomatoes and other vegetables grown under the auspices of income-generation programming.
“We cannot compete with vegetables from Greece and Macedonia although ours are better. But I am just happy to be making money in the market,” he said.
Unmentioned are the nuances of European Union subsidies to Greek farmers and the central government’s free-trade agreement with Macedonia. Both contribute to the catastrophic situations now facing Albanian farmers.
Outside the entire family gathers to show the pump. With the growing season over, it has been put in storage. The modern hardware, wrapped in protective plastic, is treated like a family treasure. The family’s genuine smiles and glowing faces transmit a thankful sincerity that is often missing in more advanced societies.
“It has always been hard for us,” Thimi said. “During the war the Germans burned everything here hunting for Partisans. We had some good years under communism with collective farming but later when the irrigation systems failed they were not replaced. Now it is capitalism and I am getting older.”
The brief description of three score years of Albanian history fires the visitor’s imagination as he sees in Thimi’s lined and rugged face the reflection of hundreds of thousands of similar Albanian lives during the twentieth century.
“World Vision has showed me a new way to work and make money by taking a loan and investing in equipment. ” Thimi said while shaking hands goodbye.
Pulling his cap down low over his head Thimi walked away in the rain. The long drought had finally ended – in so many ways – for the Pali family.