Community Support: Unlocking Nonprofit Funding Paths

Food Loan was conceived as a microloan product helping households in Lagos afford food between paychecks.

The strongest part of this project is not the interface production — it is the strategic pivot. Research with borrowers and vendors showed that a purely institutional lending model would not clear trust and repayment barriers, so the concept evolved toward peer-to-peer lending with distinct borrower and vendor flows.

Households needed short-term food financing, but the original institutional microloan model carried high perceived risk on both sides: lenders could not assess borrowers, and borrowers did not trust unfamiliar financial products.

A peer-to-peer lending structure with transparent repayment terms, a vendor-side dashboard for order and settlement visibility, and a borrower experience built around small, understandable commitments.