Grameen Bank Replication Project implemented by Grameen Trust in three townships of the Delta Zone in Myanmar, was launched in August 1997, with the financial support from UNOPS, Asia Office, Malaysia. Six staff from Grameen Trust, comprising one Zonal Manager and five Branch Managers, were deputed to Myanmar for this project. The target was to reach 13,335 poor households with micro-credit within 30 months. By January 2000, the project had already reached a total of 19,544 women borrowers in three townships of Delta Zone, with 100 percent rate of repayment.

Myanmar Project entered its 2nd phase of operation in February. UNOPS, Asia Office, has allocated an additional US$ 1,415,032 to Grameen Trust for extension of the project up to December 2001. The amount includes funds for both on lending amounting to $998,076 and operating purposes amounting to $416,956. The project plans to reach a total of 26,000 poor households by December 2001.

Organization and management
Grameen Trust is responsible for implementing the project through the Zonal Office at Bogalay in Delta. Overall responsibility of the project will rest with the Zonal Manager, who under the guidance of the Managing Director of Grameen Trust, is implementing the project on the ground.

The project organization structure and management were designed to follow the policies of Grameen Bank (GB) in Myanmar and aim at a decentralised operating system. To effectively implement the project the Zonal Manager (ZM) has been given sufficient discretionary power in operational matters, but the ZM remains accountable to GT for all his activities.

The Zonal Office is responsible for the following functions:

• Recruitment of the local staff and fixing their remuneration and other service conditions.
• Preparation of the annual work plan and budget
• Devising cost control and budget monitoring mechanisms.
• Supervising, reporting and monitoring activities of all branch offices.

The project has a established 7 unit/branch offices in 3 townships. Each unit office has a manager, field assistants, of whom at least two are women.

Operating Efficiency
The operating efficiency of the project indicates that it has achieved a high level of performance compared to similar projects and activities in many other countries including Bangladesh. In a socioeconomic and geographical situation like the Delta Zone of Myanmar, serving 275 borrowers every week and maintaining outstanding loan portfolio of 1,978,000 kyats by each field officer, is considered to be an excellent performance. Staff utilization has reached 90% in August'2000, compared to 82% in January '2000.

The project has continuously improved its financial performance. The excess of income over expenses has increased substantially and the project has achieved 119% operational sufficiency in August, 2000. It is to be noted that the operational income means all kinds of interest income excluding UNOPS subsidy for operating cost, while the operational expenses include all expenditure of the project excluding the salary of six expatriate Grameen staff.

Loan Operations
The amount of loan disbursed by the type of activities is summarized in the table:

	Activities No of Loans Amount of Loans (US $) General Seasonal Total Agriculture 997 33,536 1,727 35,263 Livestock Pig 9,364 288,526 288,526 Cows / Buffaloes 1,418 61,327 61,327 Goats / Sheep 20 568 568 Poultry 7,544 232,609 232,609 Trading 12,334 227,410 100,988 328,398 Services 7,863 279,804 4,527 284,331 Total 39,540 1,123,780 107,242 1,231,022

Poultry and livestock are the major activities of borrowers of any micro-credit program in most of the countries throughout the world. But there is always a high risk in terms of disease, death and casualty, thus putting the borrowers in serious difficulty in repayment of loan.

The project will introduce a new loan product called Micro Enterprise Loan for borrowers who have been involved for the last three years with the program and shown capacity to manage bigger business. Micro Enterprise Loans will only be offered to the graduated clients from December '2000

Programme Coverage:
Until August 2000, the program had covered 460 villages in three townships. It was operating through 7 branches and 502 centres and reached 21,862 borrowers. On a cumulative basis, US$ 1,389,000 has already been disbursed.

Loan repayments begin after one week after the loan has been received by the borrower. Borrowers have to repay the general loan with interest in weekly installments within 50 weeks. Loans are repaid at the weekly center meetings. Up to August 2000, the borrowers of seven branches have repaid US$ 973,000 in total and the repayment rate has been a perfect 100%.

Borrowers utilize their loans mostly to raise hens, ducks and pigs, sell prawns, vegetables and snacks, and purchase fishing-nets, poultry food, grocery shops, boats and sewing machines. Loan utilization was satisfactory as most borrowers have increased their household income and welfare through investments in various productive and trading activities.

Extracted from an evaluation report
submitted to Grameen Trust by Fazlul Huq Khan.