April 29, 2009 in frames of the SISF project "Provision of microcredits for women-farmers" there was organized the Round table jointly with the Microcreditbank. Representatives of government agencies of the country, credit unions, women farmers participating in the project, as well as representatives from international organizations took part in the Round table.
The purpose of the project "Provision of microcredits for women-farmers" is improving the quality of life of local people, who need social support.
The project began its history as far back as 2007, consisting of three phases.
The first phase (2007) consisted of 2 stages, when 70 women-farmers from 7 regions of republic obtained 500 000 sums each as a microcredit. "Start up capital" was formed at this stage. Then followed second stage, when additional 70 women-farmers obtained microcredits from 3 to 5 million sums each. The participants of the project studied accounting, management, development of business plan. As a result, they created 185 new jobs and most of them developed new directions of businesses.
The second phase of the project (2008) opened up the prospects of development of businesses for additional 300 new participants from Djizzak, Navoi, Samarkand, Bukhara, Andijan, Namangan and Ferghana regions. For further developing businesses they had received microcredits from 1 to 3 million sums.
Also, women-farmers attracted several young women, into the project who became the main participants of the second phase of the project and they were provided microcredits of 600 thousand sums each. This allowed them to establish their businesses that improved the economic situation of their families. In addition, women-farmers were actively involved in the training of Human resources management and Fundamentals of Doing Business". DVV International (Germany) is SISF's partner at this part of project.
The purpose of the third phase (2009), consistent with the purposes of state program «The Year of rural development», is to support farmers, laying the foundations of the formation of the movement of women farmers, creating opportunities for many rural women in Uzbekistan to receive microcredits and develop their existing businesses, as well as conditions for establishment of the Association of Women-Farmers. The project is expected to select 7 of the most successful women-farmers from 2-phase and send them abroad for further training in order to further disseminate the lessons learned to new project participants.
Also, the project partners such as People's Bank of Uzbekistan, Credit Unions, the Association of Credit Unions, the Association of Accountants and Auditors of Uzbekistan, DVV International (Germany), NDI (USA), AgLinks/USAID Project (USA) were formally presented at the Round table. The Round table participants exchanged opinions and discussed issues of efficient organization and implementation of the project in 2009, as well as the process of granting micro-credits to women-farmers and organization of competition among the participating women — "Zamonaviy uzbek qishloq ayoli" ("Modern uzbek rural woman").