I received a link to the Kiva website this morning from a client who works in Community Economic Development. The site helps facilitate micro-lending at a very individual level allowing individuals to loan funds to entrepreneurs and business people in the developing world. You can read more about the program here, but I was personally quite struck after sorting the database of businesses in need of lending by gender (results here). Not too surprisingly, I sorted by “female” and so enjoyed reading the profiles of individual businesses women are running around the world.
The way the process works is that you lend an amount of money (as little as $25 USD) to a business/business person of your choice. You then receive updates as to how that business is doing from the business person themselves (if they choose), and when your loan is repaid you can either pull it out, or reloan it to finance another business.
This seems like a really awesome way for those of use who have enjoyed success as business people to support others.
1 response so far ↓
1 stephanie nance // Jul 17, 2007 at 8:33 am
i LOVE Kiva…and the concept is fantastic. what is something so small, even for an American small biz owner, can help another make a good living for themselves; fantastic.
also, makes a good gift to loan in honor of someone.
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