Kadia Diop

Kadia Diop is forty years old and the mother of four children. Kadia first began selling fresh fish in 1998.  She buys the fish from a town called Richard-Toll which is located 250 miles (400 km) from Agnam-Goly.

The main limitation to her business is conserving the fish in the extreme temperatures of Agnam-Goly. The temperature can reach highs of 107-114 °F (40 - 45 °C). In this extreme heat her stock of fish can easily spoil if she does not manage to sell it within two days of purchase. When this happens it often causes her enormous financial losses. Kadia has been given a loan of $658 to buy a freezer. With a freezer, she can freeze the fish thereby preserving it. This will dramatically decrease the risk of loss due to spoilage while increasing the efficiency of the product to market processes and reducing the cost of fish to the residents of her village. Kadia hopes to achieve her goal of self sufficiency, reduce the cost of food and providing a better and healthier life for all in her village.

Updates about Kadia:

Kadia received $ 658 to buy a freezer to better conserve her fishes and limit losses due to the warm temperatures in Agnam-Goly. Her business is to buy fish from the riverside and then resell them in the local market. Using a part of the additional income that she generated from the freezer, she was able to pay back the loan on time. The main limitations that Kadia continues to face are transportation (she orders her fish from Richard-Toll, a town located 400 km away from Agnam-Goly) and blackouts. She now realizes that she will also need a power generator to run her freezer during a blackout. She believes that the power generator will allow her to expand her operations and generate more money locally. She is very grateful to the lenders that made this loan possible.