November Economic Conference

November 17-18 we had an economic conference for all the MCC partners that I work with. The fact that I am posting a blog about it over a month later is either a testimony to how busy I have been or how lazy I am. I thought that some of you would be interested to see the “brothers” that I am referring to when I talk about “partners.” Representatives from 12 of the 15 loan funds and credit unions from different regions in Ukraine were in attendance, and presentations covered a variety of topics.

While I feel that my Russian continues to get better all the time, I am still not quite to the place where I can lead discussions well. I’m sure I said some stupid stuff when trying to explain some things but I did my best and already was acquainted with most of the people there. Fortunately, as the picture shows, Ionka Hristozova (our country director) also attended all of the sessions and led the discussion in what I thought was the most important session which dealt with planning and reporting. This encompasses the majority of my responsibilities and I was glad that she explained why we are doing it and what we are looking for.

The conference required a lot of planning and turned out well. It seemed that those who participated thought it was interesting and beneficial.

Dave