Microcredit support which aims to assist financially challenged women in order for them to engage in income-generating activities on their own has included more than 200 thousand women micro-entrepreneurs into economic life under Turkish Grameen Microfinance Pro gram (TGMP).
Moreover, TGMP creates a social impact of TRY 4 with the utilization of TRY 1 based on Microcredit Social Impact Analysis. Hence, social impact equal to TRY 581,937,084 has been reached by disbursing TRY 143,688,169 of microcredit to 36,799 micro-entrepreneurs in 2020.
Microcredit application for the financially challenged was pioneered by Nobel Peace Prize Laurate Muhammed Yunus and has started to be implemented in Türkiye in 2003 under the leadership of Aziz Akgül, Founder of the Turkish Foundation for Waste Reduction . Turkish 1 Grameen Microfinance Program is Türkiye’s largest microfinance institution. It is non-profit microfinance organization founded in 2003 with a joint venture between TİSVA and 2 Grameen Trust . TGMP has taken the lead in providing financial services to women living in 3 poverty all around Türkiye. The organization currently operates out of 65 provinces from 94 branches across Türkiye.
TGMP’s aim is to improve the economic and social conditions of low-income families throughout Türkiye by providing them with appropriate financial services, small business skills and encouragement in a financially sustainable manner.
Turkish Grameen Microfinance Program (TGMP) is a microcredit support initiative which aims to reduce the financial distress experienced by financially challenged women as well as support their micro-initiatives.
The five person group dynamic is implemented in the microcredit system and no personal documents are required from the micro-entrepreneur except their identification card. The organization does not ask for guarantees or securities in advance from the micro entrepreneurs using microcredit and enforcement or court proceedings are not pursued in any case. Women with very low or no income are always deemed more vulnerable and preferred for microcredit approval. The philosophy of the microcredit system is that credit is a basic human right and while commercial banks disburse credit depending on the securities and guarantees provided, microcredit program is based on giving microcredit to the human being. The amount of the guarantees you provided determine your credit limit when you are applying for credit from a commercial bank while the philosophy of “the less you have the more priority you have” is followed in the microcredit system.
There is a variety of maturity options and different types of credits such as Startup Credit, Operational Credit, Basic Credit, Development Credit, Entrepreneurial Credit, Growth Credit and Social Development Credit. In addition, TGMP offers different services to micro-entrepreneurs such as Mini Insurance, Mini Housing Insurance and a Voluntary Savings Account.
Day to day operations are aimed to be accomplished by using the latest trends in information technology as much as possible in Turkish Grameen Microfinance Program. POS devices were being used in repayment collection and they were replaced by the NFC technology (col lection by mobile phone) in 2013. QR system (repayment collection through tablets) was adopted in 2020 which dramatically reduced the overall waste of paper. An automatic SMS is sent including the collection amount and remaining debt for the confirmation of the collection so that the system can operate reliably.
The system that is in place provides a 100% repayment ratio which commercial banks cannot achieve even with the lowest amount of credits services.
Microcredit application that was pioneered by Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Prof. Muhammad Yunus has been officially launched in Türkiye by the President of Türkiye Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Diyarbakır on 18th July 2003.
Demand for microfinance services can be understood from the perspective of micro and small businesses that seek access to capital in order to fund their operations and growth as well as poor households that desire access to savings deposits, microinsurance and other financial products. Microfinance sector in Türkiye is still in its early stages despite this demand.
Turkish Grameen Microfinance Program (TGMP) was founded in 2003 and is present in nearly all provinces of Türkiye. TGMP is one of the largest microfinance organizations in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region and a field partner of Grameen Trust. Micro-
credits distributed by the program has recently exceeded TRY 1 billion 260 million . Turkish 4 Grameen Microfinance Program still actively provides microcredit support to more than 45 thousand low-income women in 65 provinces.
TGMP’s main objective is to alleviate poverty by increasing the financial inclusion of women through providing microfinance. The analysis evaluates TGMP’s impact on shareholders which includes our micro-entrepreneurs, partners and municipalities that we have a partner ship with. All stakeholders were asked what the initial outcome has changed in their life in order to identify the well-defined outcome. Seven positive well-defined outcomes have been identified.
- Social Network: Experienced by 78% of stakeholders
- Increase in purchasing power: Experienced by 79% of stakeholders
- Improvement of family relations: Experienced by 60% of stakeholders 4.
- Being respected by others: Experienced by 67% of stakeholders
- Increase in self-confidence
- Increase in financial literacy: Experienced by 83% of stakeholders
- Increase in emotional wellbeing: Experienced by 85% of stakeholders
- Increase in vocational wellbeing: Experienced by 76% of stakeholders
- Increase in quality of social life: Experienced by 49% of stakeholders
- Being able to cope with financial problems: Experienced by 72% of stakeholders
- Prof. Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank were both awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for their work to “create economic and social development from below”. 5 Grameen Bank’s objective has been to grant financially challenged people small loans on easy terms. TGMP continues its microcredit activities in Turkey and it is inspired by this system as a field partner of Grameen Trust.
- Turkish Foundation for Waste Reduction was deemed worthy of the “Outstanding Ser vice Award” by the Grand National Assembly of Turkey in 2009.
- Cover of Time Magazine dated March 24th 2008 presented the microcredit system amongst the “10 Ideas That Changed the World”. 6
- “Woman Power for Economy Project” which TGMP is running in cooperation with Turkcell won the IPRA Grand Prize and it was voted as the most successful corporate social responsibility project in the world at the 2013 IPRA Golden Globe Awards.
- In 2019, Turcomoney Magazine awarded TGMP Non-Governmental Organization of the year.
- Kybele Documentary Film was awarded by ÜNSPED Women’s Leadership Develop ment Committee, Buyernetwork B2B Business and Trade Platform 9•
- Kybele Documentary Film was accepted to the “The Women’s Voices Now Film Col lection” platform on August 6, 2021
- At the 18th International Ethno Film Festival – The Heart of Slavonia Film Festival-, Kybele film was awarded the “Bronze Heart of Slovenia” in the Best Film category.
- Kybele Documentary directed by Orhan Tekeoğlu was deemed worthy of the social life award in “12th Film Educational Film Festival”; also known as “EDUKINO” Film Festival.
- Kybele Documentary was deemed worthy of the honor award at the “12th Film Educa tional Film Festival” in the briefing on December 9, 2021.
- Kybele Film Documentary was announced as the 2021 award winners of the In ternational Istanbul Nartugan Film Festival, after the Dhaka Film Festival, held on 13-16 December 2021