Global Cycle Solutions (GCS) distributes improved cookstoves that save its’ customers money, are warrantied and are selected for the East African customer base to be sold by its network of local entrepreneurs called Rafiki (“friend” in Swahili). The person in the photo is one of these based in the Kahama branch of GCS. The entrepreneurs have gone on to earn enough money from sales to buy livestock, improve their houses and educate their children. At the same time, their customers save money on lighting, phone charging, cooking and health costs.
Over the last five years, GCS has become a social enterprise that prides itself in providing opportunities for entrepreneurship for both men and women, and improving lives through better technology.
The GCS Kahama branch will use the Kiva loan to pass credit on to its large network of agents that work out in the Kahama area in Tanzania, and then on to customers who would benefit from the stove the most.
Buying a stove outright with cash is very difficult for most of these people. Through Kiva, GCS will be able to give them a payment process and thus make the purchase of a stove possible for many people who would not have had that opportunity otherwise.