The Townships Project

To Make a Donation – click here

Or send a cheque payable to The Townships Project, c/o 90 Adelaide Street West, Suite 600, Toronto, Ontario M5H 3V9

You will receive a tax receipt for donations of $20 or more.

Mission

Poverty can be eradicated. Micro-credit is a proven technology in the global fight against it.

Since May 1999 The Townships Project has been supporting South African microfinance institutions (MFIs) in township areas in South Africa. These MFIs make repayable, interest-bearing loans to entrepreneurs, primarily women, to operate a range of small businesses, to become self-sustaining and to break the cycle of poverty. As of July 2010, The Townships Project has changed nearly 80,000 lives at an investment of about $50 per person.. Our goal is to ensure that every South African who needs such a loan has access to it and to ensure that our South African partners become self-sustaining.

Vision

The Townships Project is tackling a difficult job – raising the infrastructure funds needed to build an early stage MFI. There are many NGOs (e.g. kiva.org), banks and government institutions that provide loan money for micro loans once an MFI is up and functioning, but finding the infrastructure and training support necessary to build the institution to that viable stage is a huge challenge. We use a “made in South Africa” approach to this task, which takes into consideration the challenges posed by the highest HIV/AIDs infection rate in the world and a poor education and skills base. Despite South Africa’s highly-developed infrastructure and first world economy, 20 million struggle to survive on $2 or less per day.

Values

The Townships Project is a registered charity in Canada and is authorized to issue charitable donation receipts for income tax purposes. The United Nations Development Programme has recognized micro-lending as the single most effective mechanism in the front-line struggle against poverty in developing countries. In the words of Muhammad Yunus, winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, “I have come to believe, deeply and firmly, that we can create a poverty free world if we want to. I came to this conclusion not as a product of a pious dream, but as a concrete result of experience gained in the work of the Grameen Bank.” The Townships Project shares this belief and has been working to alleviate poverty in the townships of South Africa since early 1999.

Receipt and Use of Funds

In 2009, The Townships Project spent 2.6% of its funds on administrative costs. You will receive a tax receipt for a donation of $20 or more.

Your funds are used to support two microfinance institutions in South Africa, Tetla Financial Solutions which works in the townships outside Cape Town, and Phakamani Foundation which works in the townships outside White River, about 4 hours drive east of Johannesburg. Together, those two institutions now make about 1000 loans per month. Typically each borrower has between 5 and 7 dependents, so it is conservative to assume that each loan changes 5 lives. Your funds are also used to support ways to make those loans more effective and the borrowers more successful. In 2010, those efforts led to the Four Wheel Drive Mobile approach to poverty alleviation, incorporating other existing resources to ensure that borrowers receive the best possible chance at success. The first “wheel” is Asset-Based Community Development, which asks the question “What do we have?” rather than “What do we need?” This focuses a community on using what it has to get what it wants. Microfinance, the second “wheel”, supports the resulting commercial initiatives. Corporate social investment, mandated in South Africa, is the “third” wheel, sought from local companies to support community initiatives. the fourth “wheel” is microfranchising and other commercial solutions to systematize, replicate and brand a business. “Mobile” technology uses cellphones to increase the efficiency of tiny businesses, from cellphone banking to cellphone accounting and training. The Townships Project is actively working with partners in each of these areas to increase the effectiveness of microlending. Partners in this initiative are planning the First International Microfranchising Trade Show and Conference in Khayelitsha and Cape Town from August 31 – September 2, 2011.

Founder and CEO

F. Martha Deacon, B.A. (Hons), LL.B.
Ms. Deacon is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Townships Project, an international charitable organization that supports micro-lending in South Africa. Between 1994 and 1998, Ms. Deacon founded and was the Chief Executive Officer of P1 Parking Systems Inc., which was purchased by Imperial Parking Limited in 1998. From 1986 to 1994, Ms. Deacon was Vice-President Corporate Finance and a director of BZW Canada Limited and its predecessor firms. Before becoming an investment banker, Ms. Deacon was a solicitor with the Toronto law firm of Fraser & Beatty (now Fraser Milner Casgrain).

Why Should the Mining Industry Get Behind This?

The mining, financial and mining service industry in particular has the most to gain by embracing this challenge at the earliest stage. A successful campaign accompanied by substantial press can establish the industry as a leader in social responsibility, environmental sustainability and as a powerful force behind the economic welfare of Africa. Partnering with The Townships Project is a chance to get on-board, helping Africans, women in particular, to escape poverty by starting or expanding their own small businesses.