Zafèn, a new online microfinance program targeting small- and medium-sized Haitian businesses, has achieved inspiring early success, raising more than $50,000 in loans and donations from more than 200 contributors in its first two months of operation.

Contributions at www.zafen.org have ranged from $25 to $5,000 and resulted in the planting of more than 200 fruit trees and coffee plants, as well as scholarships for an entire Haitian elementary school for a year. In all, 13 proposals have attracted the attention of contributors who provided interest-free loans and have enabled entrepreneurs to begin expanding their ventures, hiring more employees and sparking systemic change in their local economies.

"For many Haitians who live on $1 or $2 per day, an influx of thousands of dollars into a region can make a crucial difference," says the Rev. Robert Maloney, C.M., who chairs the Vincentian Family Board, one of the project’s founding partners.

In its introductory weeks, Zafèn attracted more than 600 Facebook fans from 20 countries, visitors from 85 nations and has proven most popular in Chicago, New York, Montreal, Miami and Freeport, Bahamas.

Zafèn ("It’s our business" in Haitian Creole) was developed to stimulate collaboration between Haiti-based business owners, the Haitian Diaspora and others interested in supporting the Haitian economy. Zafèn is unique in its criteria because businesses must demonstrate an anticipated impact on the broader community from the loan or donation by hiring more employees, operating more efficiently, becoming more environmentally friendly or other measures.

"This strategy not only provides access to capital for the Haitian entrepreneur," says DePaul Management Professor Laura Hartman, "but it respects the dignity of the individual because it recognizes their contribution in the form of human and knowledge capital, both vital for the success of the Haitian economy. This is a true partnership." Hartman is a widely published business ethicist and expert on global poverty alleviation who worked with a technical team at DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media to create this new Internet pathway connecting Haitian businesses with lenders.

Zafèn was founded jointly by four organizations: the international Vincentian community, as many as 2 million people worldwide affiliated with organizations who find inspiration in the legacies of St. Vincent de Paul and St. Louise de Marillac; DePaul University in Chicago, the largest Catholic university in America; Fonkoze, Haiti’s alternative bank for the organized poor serving 47,000 borrowers; and the Haitian Hometown Associations Resource Group, which enables the Haitian Diaspora to foster economic and social growth to alleviate poverty in their native communities.

Unique features of www.zafen.org include:

• Contributions linked in real time to projects that await funding, which goes directly to the project(s) users select, 
• The ability of users to track their loans, watch them return, then re-lend or withdraw – all online, and
• Use of PayPal for secure, easy and reliable loans/donations. 

New business opportunities are added to zafen.org regularly.

• Kiskeya Aqua Ferme, which raises red tilapia fish and black pigs, is the largest employer in Petite-Riviere, Leogane. It seeks support to increase production to improve local food security and fund community development, including a free on-site medical clinic.

• The Cooperative Agricole et Commercialisation de Dianville wants to buy a water pump to irrigate its sugar cane crop. It will use increased profits to provide free schooling and meals to more children and offer free literacy education for adults living in Savane Dianville.

• Notre Dame de Lourdes seeks water treatment equipment to expand the availability of individual servings of water distributed in pouches by a network of 256 women in Port-au-Prince and beyond.

Anne Hastings, Fonkoze’s director, said, "It is so important that we scale up Zafèn quickly so we can destroy the myth that there are not many credit-worthy small and medium enterprises in Haiti. We believe there are." That confidence is based on Fonkoze’s experiences serving rural Haiti for 15 years and its current management of 200,000 savings accounts through 41 local branches.

Scholarships to educate Haitian children have fared well. The "Learn to Read and Write" tuition program by FATEM received tuition for 500 children, which was doubled by a matching-gift program by the Vincentian family, enabling 1,000 students to enroll for a year and receive nutritious meals at school.  The Mirebalais Education Project Society, which is based in Canada, awarded 339 of those scholarships.

A distinguished delegation from Haiti visited DePaul in May to discuss a new school that will be built in Mirebalais on land contributed by the municipality and secured by Sen. Edmonde Supplice Beauzile of the Central Plateau. The school will be operated by FATEM with seed funding from Zynga Game Network. DePaul will help prepare the teachers while Chicago-based Francis W. Parker School will help develop the curriculum and administrative structure. Dutch-based Bureau de Nutrition et Développement, directed by Rob Padberg, will coordinate the school meals program.

Zafèn launched April 1, 2010, at DePaul University. The inaugural event was attended by the Hon. Lesly Condé, consul general of Haiti based in Chicago. He said at that event, "There is a new era on the horizon. I have no doubt that my compatriots have the necessary resilience to face the challenges at hand. But we need more than that. We need a set of new strategies that must involve every Haitian at home and abroad as well as friends of our country from the four corners of the globe."

Katleen Felix, chair of the Haitian Hometown Associations Resource Group and Haitian Diaspora liaison with Fonkoze, agrees. "The Hometown Associations are very enthusiastic about this opportunity," she said. "Zafèn is responding to their request to have pre-selected projects they can support that are replicable and will make a difference in Haiti."

In late April, Haitian students at St. John’s University hosted a New York City launch, where Brooklyn Auxiliary Bishop Guy Sansaricq, the only Haitian-born U.S. bishop, appealed to the Haitian Diaspora to use www.zafen.org as a way to fund viable enterprises that will contribute to a self-sustaining Haitian economy.

Artists have been popular among Zafèn funders. To date, projects at Production Blaize, Erick Lafond’s Architecture Shop, Zoo d’Art Studio and Mario Shop, all in Jacmel, have been financed. The food service industry also has been well represented, with projects funded at Gilda’s Peanut Sweets, Mona’s Frozen Treats and Maudi Bar all in Arcahaie, and Modernity Chez Tata Bar & Restaurant in Dondon.

The Cooperative Agricole Vincent Oge de Dondon has served as an entry point for many donors, who can donate as little as $25 to enable the cooperative to buy more fruit and coffee trees. It is planning to hire a technical advisor on organic farming to improve the quality and quantity of fruit and coffee production in the region and educate local farmers.

Other early successes include MC+Productions, a printer that will expand its digital identification badge business; Ile à Vache Development Group, whose non-wood charcoal project was funded three times; and the La Montagne de Jacmel Community Corn Mill, which wants to grow more local corn because it is the second-most consumed food in Haiti after rice.

"The most hopeful aspects of Zafèn are the connections being made between Haitians with dreams for a more prosperous future and people around the world who support those aspirations," said Buck Close, president of 1000 Jobs/Haiti, Zafèn’s fiscal agent. "As this process continues, these connections can develop into a true network for development in Haiti one small business at a time."