In the name of God, most beneficent and merciful!
KICKING-OFF 2019
We left behind an incredible year during which we proudly served 1,753,871 client members, an increase of 221,176 clients compared to 2017. I humbly stand before our client members, those who have given ASA Philippines their trust and blessed us with dignity, honor and better financial capability. I deeply believe that we are "dedicated to better the life of the poor" though as it turns out the poor reciprocated more than we ever expected. This incredible performance enjoined us to be more dedicated to our mission to serve the poor. We are forever grateful to them. In our quest to find ways to serve them better, we reemphasized our client community services (CCS). In the year 2018 we spent over ₱377 million under CCS which is equivalent to 17% of our gross revenue or 7% of our net surplus. This ₱377 million is on top of the ₱1.30 billion in discounts we proudly repaid to the clients as rebates on their payments. This total rebate of ₱1.30 billion was made possible because of the tax rebate ASA Philippines received from the government through Republic Act No. 10693. Credit goes to our client members whom we recognize as our "bosses" as all those CCS funds and rebates come from their own contributions.
In this world, whatever we do, be it commercial business or social work, we capitalize on human relationships in combination with our ethics and faith. It is people who make everything possible and it is our faith in God and in our people which make us strong. Our success is deeply rooted in the invaluable relationships established between our client members and our staff. Therefore, major credit goes to our staff, in particular our Micro-Finance Officers (MFOs), our heroes who made this wonderful success a reality. It is our MFOS who risk their lives every working day, drive long distances to serve the neglected poor in very remote areas. I commend all my managerial colleagues who led our hero MFOs in the right direction. Their leadership enabled us to grow our portfolio by 31% from ₱13.44 billion in 2017 to ₱17.66 billion in 2018. Their calculated risk-taking and their ability to inspire our BMs and MFOs were major factors in our success. As almost all of our staff come from a less privileged background, we are an ideal example that the poor can help themselves, therefore ASA Philippines is an effort "of the poor, by the poor, for the poor ".
It is time for us to look into other services we can provide to our clients, what more we can contribute to society. Our intervention in Marawi, helping to rebuild the city with a CCS budget of ₱17 million, shall be replicated in 2019 in other parts of Muslim Mindanao. We hope these interventions will help in the peace process in the areas where peace is elusive.
Wishing all a great year in 2019!
Kamrul Hasan Tarafder
President & CEO
February 2019