What Project Would A Laptop Help You With?

Effective Management for Groupements.

Short Description Of Project

I am an agronomist by training, but since 1997 have been an entrepreneur, teacher and consultant. I am certified to teach business management and use that certification as well as my own experience to assists entrepreneurs and women’s cooperatives. I currently work with 10 women’s cooperatives on a volunteer basis. The cooperatives work in gardening, agriculture, fabric dying, and soap making. In total, I am assisting over 120 women in the town of Kindia and the nearby village of Kebé-Friguia. I teach them how to manage projects, to do basic accounting and bookkeeping, to create and follow a self-generated constitution, and connect them with best practices from other cooperatives. Since all of this is impossible if the women are illiterate and innumerate, I also teach the women how to read and write in their local language. The leadership of the cooperatives are typically literate, but if all the members have equal access to information, then the work is more transparent.

How Would A Laptop Help You?

I need a computer to professionally write up and mange projects, build a database, and create formal marketing materials. I also hope to use the computer to help these women find international buyers for their products and sell them over the Internet. Additionally, we will be able to do research on the Internet to find out what international buyers are looking for. I will also train the presidents, treasurers, and secretaries of the cooperatives to use the computer so that eventually they will be able to manage digital documents without my assistance.

Computers give the user a way to communicate rapidly, to learn, and the safe keep information. They are the most important tool of this century.

What Languages do you speak?

French, SouSou, Malinke, Pular