Archive for September, 2009
Takin’ it to the Web: Online Microbusinesses Thrive in Recession
By Erica Dorn, KF7 and now Kiva Coordinator at ACCION USA
I spend a good chunk of my time at ACCION USA trying to explain to the entrepreneurs what Kiva is, and why they should be as excited as I am to get their profiles on the internet so regular people can lend to them. So, you can imagine my surprise when an ACCION USA borrower, Dan, told me he found out about ACCION USA through Kiva’s website, instead of the other way around!
Dan and his self-designed greeting cards (more…)
Introducing the Guinea Pig…
By Bryan Goldfinger, KF9 (Peru)
At the KF9 graduation ceremony, each newly appointed Fellow received a Thank You card signed by most of the Kiva staff. Many staff members included a simple message and their signature (keep in mind, each one had to write on 49 separate cards), several included a witty remark and one or two left longer messages possibly containing some parting advice for the field. Although I appreciated each message and signature equally, there was one that stuck out from the rest, not necessarily because of who wrote it, or because it was written in green ink and in all capital letters, or because it was near the top of the card directly in the center, but because it read simply, “GOOD LUCK, GUINEA PIG!!” (more…)
How to turn on an oven in Chiapas
Watch a video about how to light a stove in Coapilla, Chiapas, Mexico.
Continue Reading 27 September 2009 at 17:27 Julia Kastner 6 comments
Graduating the Cabby Test = Kiva Fellow!
By Kimia Raafat, KF9 (Ecuador)
Last night, I said goodbye to my KF9 classmates and flagged down a cab. Departing KFP9 graduation dinner, I couldn’t help but wonder, “Am I really ready to be a graduate? to be a Kiva Fellow?!”
I pushed my uncertainties to the side while greeting and directing my cab driver. He was a friendly Ethiopian man and obviously curious about what I had been doing with the rowdy crowd in Baghdad Nights. Maybe he saw all of the ridiculously good looking people inside (my KF9 classmates and/or Kiva Staff members)? perhaps he caught a glimpse of some belly dancing? Or any of the Kiva staff/fellow dancing for that matter! Regardless of the reasoning, my cab driver wanted to know more about what I was doing.
When suddenly it hit me! This was my graduation test! (more…)
Countdown to Kyrgyzstan
By Rob Packer, KF9 (Kyrgyzstan)
It’s been a short six months since I first found out about Kiva and in that time I’ve moved from having an interest in poverty alleviation and a vague desire to “do a bit more” to graduating yesterday as a fully-fledged KF9 Kiva Fellow. And my physical journey to Kiva has been no less of a complete change of direction: it started six months ago with me working for an investment bank in Hong Kong, and continued with persuading Indonesian internet cafe owners to let me have interviews over Skype in the dead of the night, returning to my hometown of London, England for a few weeks to say goodbye to friends and family, and finally arriving at Kiva Fellows training in San Francisco. My journey to my placement with Mol Bulak Finance in Kyrgyzstan will take me most of the way back to where I started.
KF9 Graduation with Kiva Staff and KF9 Kiva Fellows
One of the most obvious differences between my placement and most other Kiva Fellow placements is that I won’t be dealing with extreme heat. (more…)
Welcome to the family, KF9!
Congratulations on finishing training… enjoy your graduation tonight!
Kiva Fellows Training KF9 – Flip Camera Mystery
By: Mary Riedel, KF9 Philippines
Hi, My name is Mary Riedel and I’m a Kiva Fellow in training! I leave for Cabanatuan City, Philippines within days (pending successful Kiva Fellows graduation of course)! I should be packing my apartment up in San Francisco as I write this but I’ve started playing with some video editing software and can’t stop! I’m trying to learn how to create some cool videos for the Kiva Fellows Blog. This is pretty new for me so I hope you’ll hang with me and my rookie video posts – hopefully you can watch them get better and better while I am out in the field.
Here’s a little footage from the Kiva Fellows Training KF9 happening this week in San Francisco. In this clip we (“Anne Hector KF9, Kenya” “Mary Riedel KF9, Philippines” “Mohammed Al-shawaf KF9, Palestine” “Sheethal Shobowale KF9, Peru” “Adam Preston KF9, Philippines” and “Hanna Azemati KF9, Kenya”) are learning the ropes on using a Flip cam from Teresa Dunbar KF Alumni.
Excited to be training
Hello All Fans of Kiva,
My name is Ed Coambs and I am very excited to be joining the Kiva fellows team. I am in San Francisco, CA and the weather is great, the other fellows are amazing and soon I will have great stories from the Philippines to share.
Best Wishes,
Ed
In Freetown
By Jenny Kim, KF8 Sierra Leone
When I told people I was headed to Sierra Leone to work with a local NGO the universal response was “have you thought this through” and “be careful”. More than 4 years after UN Peacekeeping forces pulled out of Sierra Leone following a brutal and devastating 11 year civil war, people continue to associate Sierra Leone with violence or with the Hollywood blockbuster film Blood Diamonds. I can’t say I was that much more enlightened when I chose to live and work in Freetown, the capital city. After grabbing several books, a couple of documentaries, and hours on the internet, my cursory research painted a picture full of machete-wielding and AK47-toting child soldiers alternately terrorizing villages and mining for diamonds. Not good and dated info. Contacts urged me to find accommodations in a gated and well-guarded compound. Advice I took. And others told me to NEVER go out after dark. Advice I ignored. People tried to warn me about getting to town from Lungi Airport which purportedly was a gamble with my life given the three transport options– a “treacherous” ferry whose schedule can sometimes be a mystery, a hovercraft that has “exploded and ran out of fuel mid-trip in the past”, or a helicopter that has crashed several times. Stellar options. And only half true it turns out. With these thoughts swirling around in my head, I arrived in Sierra Leone last week. Since then I’ve been trying to wrap my head around this fascinating country, making a go of untangling some of the myths, tall tales, half truths, and sobering realities as best I can during my 2 month stay.
Observation #1
Sierra Leone needs better PR (more on this in the next blog). The country suffers from an undeserved and badly tattered public image—essentially a snapshot taken in perhaps the worst period of it’s history. Although the war is still very much woven into the fabric of this country and almost without exception every individual I have encountered has either witnessed atrocities or has suffered directly at the hands of warring factions, most Sierra Leoneans want to focus on rebuilding the country. Here in Freetown, perpetrators of murders, rapes, and mutilations live peaceably side by side with their victims. As my taxi driver put it to me, “What else can we do. We need to heal and move on.” The Truth and Reconciliation Trials continue to try the “big fish” a co-worker tells me. But “who can tell who was forced to kill and who can tell who was forced to take cocaine and drugs in order to cut off people’s wrists or legs? I don’t understand it. But we forgive and we have to live as brothers. It’s the past.”
Some context…
Ranked at the very bottom of the UN Human Development Index, Sierra Leone is one of the poorest countries in the world with a whole host of challenges in front of it. 1 in 6 mothers die here in childbirth making Sierra Leone the most dangerous place in the world to become a mother. Once born, 1 in 4 children will not survive past the age of 5. If you consider that Sierra Leone is a donor-driven nation which receives over a third of it’s annual budget from other countries and abroad, one can begin to grasp the magnitude of the work ahead when the national agenda includes combating severe infrastructure deficiencies, a non-existent healthcare system, illiteracy, and corruption.
- 1 in 6 mothers die as a result of childbirth (more than anywhere else recorded in the world)
- 1 in 4 children will never turn five
- 70% of the population live below the poverty line
- 57% of the population do not make a dollar a day
- Less than 10% of population has access to energy
- 1/3 of the Sierra Leonian government budget every year is donated
- Life expectancy at birth is 42 years (2007)
- Ranked 177 out of 177 countries in UN’s Human Development Index
- Ranked 168 out of 175 countries by World Bank for ease of doing business
- Average GDP per person is $209 (adjusting for purchasing power parity approximately $800)
Sources: UN, Unicef, World Bank, Sierra Leone by Bradt
The video below is of my first loan visit in Dove Court market located in Freetown.
Ecuador Bound!
By Zal, KF9 Ecuador
Good day, folks. My name is Zal, and this Friday, September 25, I’ll officially be anointed a Kiva Fellow for the KF9 Class bound for Ecuador working with Fundacion ESPOIR! It’s been an absolutely wonderful experience meeting all the Kiva Fellows this week at the Kiva HQ in San Francisco, CA.
I’ve been working as a Product Manager at YouTube for the past two years and will be taking a three-month leave for my fellowship. Previously, I spent three years at Microsoft in Seattle working on Windows anti-piracy in China and Brazil. So, I’m very excited to be returning to South America! After volunteering on and off for Kiva.org over the past year, the day is fast approaching for my departure to Quito, and I couldn’t be more excited.
You can find me on Facebook and YouTube, and of course, right here on the Kiva Fellows blog with more updates, videos, thoughts and experiences from my time at ESPOIR’s offices in Quito, Cuenca and Portoviejo (in Manabi). Look forward to more ESPOIR loans, journal updates and blogs from me starting the second week of October!
KF9 Kicks it off!
By Kelly McKinnon, KF9, Nicaragua
Hey there, I wanted to take a second to introduce myself. I’m Kelly and I’m headed to Leon, Nicaragua to work with Fundacion Leon 2000. We’re mid-way through our week of training here at Kiva headquarters, I could not be more excited about being a part of this fellows team as well as the greater Kiva Love Machine!
I’ll begin posting as soon as I can and will report all about Fundacion Leon, in the meantime you can begin to get to know the borrowers that I’ll be working with by clicking on this link to Fundacion Leon’s Kiva portfolio.
Beyond learning the ins and outs of microfinance I’m excited for volcano exploring and finding my way to the coast to explore some waves…
Women in Hats
By Suzy Marinkovich, KF9 Bolivia
We can’t get enough of them. We love them so much that they even have their own lending team of fans and a discussion on KivaFriends. Whether they are made of straw or soft fabric, bowler, flat-brimmed, or a tiny saucer looking thing on our borrower’s heads – we just love them.
There is an old English adage that says, “If you want to get ahead in life, you should get yourself a hat.”
I like hats, and I’ll wear one every now and again – maybe for Opening Day in Del Mar or during a long hike to beat the heat (and, of course, during San Diego Padres baseball games). But down here, it’s an essential part of your everyday cholita’s wardrobe – it’s her piece of flair, her fashion statement, and it’s also almost always a statement about where she comes from. Her hat may very well give away her hometown – and whether others see her as a Cochabambina or an Ayacuchana, for example.
When I saw our “Women in Hats” lending team, I was in love! I promise not to get all deep on you, but I thought it was such a cute, simple way that cultures across the world can come together through Kiva – by celebrating even the simplest of accessories. It also conveys why loaning on Kiva is so fun (and addictive) for us!
So, I decided to do a little light research into this hat phenomenon. Since I arrived in Bolivia from Peru, the hat styles have definitely changed. These ones are usually small bowler hats and I cannot for the life of me figure out how they seem to defy physics by not flying off their owner’s heads. Sometimes they are tilted off to the side, sometimes they add a solid 10 inches to a woman’s height – which I guess lends itself to the aforementioned English adage.
I began by Googling “bowler hats Bolivia” and soon found out that they’re called a “bombin” down here. When I Googled that however, all I got were a bunch of articles on bombings (since Google was certain I made a typo) and some Wu Tang Clan lyrics about “bombin’ buildings.” I take it that bombin hats aren’t a typical Google search. Regardless, I dug a little deeper and here’s a synopsis of what I found:
The bowler hat – or bombin – has been worn by Quechua and Aymara women in Peru and Bolivia since the 1920s, when it was introduced to Bolivia by British railway workers. Rumor has it that the hats were found to be too small for their intended recipients, so they were then distributed to the locals. For many years a factory in Italy manufactured the hats for the Bolivian market. Now, however, they are produced internationally. This seems to be the most popular theory of bombin origination. (Main source: Wikipedia.org)
Another rumored and uncorroborated bombin hat theory involves an over-order of bowler hats by an enterprising salesman, who supposedly convinced the Bolivian locals that the wearing of hats would increase their fertility. Whether that was once the belief or not, you may be relieved to know that this rumor certainly isn’t prevalent today.
Mexican Markets and Microentrepreneurs
By Julia Kastner, KF9
Hello!
I start my placement with Fundación Realidad on Monday, but I’ve been in Mexico a few days now and I wanted to share with you some footage of some of my favorite Mexican microentrepreneurs – the market venders. This footage is taken from the Condesa marketplace in Mexico City, one of the nicest markets I’ve seen (almost like a farmer’s market in the States), which I think shows how skilled the venders are at their work. More to come!
Cochabamgringa en el Hospital
By Suzy Marinkovich, KF9
My husband walked in to the CIDRE office this Tuesday around 5pm, smiling big but smelling awful. Everyone crowded around and asked, “Mateo! Como le ha ido?” – “How was your [first] day?” I could tell they were worried all day when they had asked me if I heard from him, but I knew he was fine. They may worry that this gringo from the States, who is still very much learning Spanish, can’t hang in ‘el campo’ (the farm). But Matt loves that kind of stuff.
My husband is a veterinary technician back home, and is currently applying to veterinary school. When he agreed to come join me on this 8-month adventure, both of us worried about what it would look like for him – as we had zero plans and no idea where I’d even be come second and third placement. But the experience has been as remarkable for him as it has for me. At CIDRE, the loan officers set him up with the very veterinarians who take care of the CIDRE borrowers’ precious bovine. I’ll discuss his dirty work with more detail in another blog post – but let me just give you a taste… his first day involved delivering a baby calf and neutering pigs. Just another day at the office, right?
Click the pic: it's a shameless plug for CIDRE's new lending team!
CIDRE is one of Kiva’s brand-new Latin American partners, and is extremely well-respected here in Bolivia. The founder, Alvaro, does a wonderful job operating the business and his plans for CIDRE’s growth are both tangible and exciting.
Hours after I arrived here in Cochabamba last week, I began mysteriously throwing up over and over again. In a delirious state and in the hands of my husband, I made it to the hospital – where I was promptly hooked up to fluids.
To Have Illusions
By Shereef Zaki, KF9, Perú
What do you want to be when you grow up? What are your hopes? What are your dreams?
Throughout my childhood, these questions constantly attached themselves to the most prosaic daily interactions. In a sense I, and most of my peers, were conditioned to be ambitious dreamers, convinced of the limitless possibilities our futures held (and still hold).
When speaking with borrowers one of our unstated goals as Kiva Fellows is to uncover their latent sense of possibility and excitement at the prospect of success. During interviews I attempt to understand what aspiring entrepreneurs want for themselves and for their children. But one of the harshest realities that I confront concerns the occasional and precise absence of aspiration.
In no way am I implying laziness or even a lack of imagination; rather, survival tends to distract many Kiva clients from the potential realities that accompany success. And then I had an a-ha moment. While interviewing Yesenia Esmeralda Bances Morales (click to contribute to her loan), who seemed bemused when she heard the question ‘what are your hopes or dreams in life’ it dawned on me that it might have been the first time anyone had ever asked her that question.
Yesenia Selling at the Market
Comparing Malaria Solutions
Artemisinin: an ancient malaria cure for 21st century Africa
Continue Reading 16 September 2009 at 16:54 DaveMcMurtry 7 comments
Microcredit Operators–>Microbanks–>Banks
By Cameron Morris, KF8 Mozambique
Microcredit operators, microbanks, and banks are the three primary designations for consumer facing financial institutions in Mozambique. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been spending some of my time assisting the Kiva portfolio team with MFI recruitment. I’ve met with a full range of financial institutions with executive directors as diverse as the populations they serve.
I would guess that currently the majority of Kiva’s partners fall into the microcredit or microbank category. These institutions are the quaint organizations that usually characterize microfinance and that more importantly meet the requirements for working with Kiva.
What I’m curious about is what will happen when these institutions start to mature. (more…)
Spreading the Kiva love…
by Cissy DeLuca, KF8, Indonesia
This past week is my last week working at TLM in West Timor. TLM is also partnered with Opportunity International (OI) Australia, which is their primary source of funding. To promote this relationship, TLM often hosts “Insight Trips,” which allow supporters of OI to pay a fee to visit a partner MFI of their choice. These trips promote donor understanding and create the potential for them to further contribute to the work of the MFI.
TLM staff members introducing the Australian guests to a client
Eight Australians arrived this past Monday to be toured around to visit clients, see the office, meet the staff and gain an insider perspective on microfinance and TLM. Upon hearing I was working on behalf of Kiva, an instant fan club materialized right before my eyes. They wanted to know everything they possibly could about Kiva and their partnership with TLM. Some had heard of it, while others had not. This resulted in me hosting an impromptu training session at my desk on how to use the Kiva website. One of the Australians had even googled “TLM” and “Microfinance” prior to the trip and stumbled upon the fellows blog and a video I had made! He had known of the existence of a “Cissy” at TLM before he even arrived… I am a minor celebrity!
Microentrepreneurs, Remembering 9/11
Luis was one of the first Kiva borrowers I interviewed as a fellow at ACCION USA. His sincerity and open heart are noticeable from the very beginning.
When Kiva’s president Premal Shah came to NYC during the domestic launch he had a chance to meet Luis. As Premal, Gina Harman (ACCION USA CEO), Paul Quintero (ACCION USA CFO), and I began to talk to Luis about his road to entrepreneurship, his true story unfolded.
Luis faced many hardships coming to this country and building a life for himself. On September 11, 2001 he made a delivery to the World Trade Centers and left just minutes before the first plane hit. Luis survived, his delivery van did not.
Through a unique loan progam offered by ACCION USA after 9/11, microentreprenuers like Luis were able to get funding to get their businesses back up and running after the tragic day. ACCION USA’s American Dream Fund supported over 300 small business owners after the crisis of September 11.
Watch the rare video as Luis tells his story of entrepreneurship and talks about his experiences on that tragic day. It is a testament to the role that small business played in helping New York recover after 9/11.
_______________________________________________________
Erica Dorn coordinates the Kiva Program at ACCION USA. She is a former Kiva Fellow. edorn@accionusa.org
A Great Vision Can Lead a Businessman Far
The Best Lahmajun Place in Yerevan — Mer Taghr or “Our Street”:
“A friend in need is a friend indeed”
Volunteering in the field of microfinance since May 2009, I have encountered numerous borrower stories that absolutely inspire me. For many, receiving a small credit is a matter of survival, not a matter of ambition. The borrowers’ commitment to work and their willingness to fight so hard are two reasons why Kiva exists. Kiva’s goal is to remove the conditions for this need. Through my encounters with Kiva borrowers, I have learned to appreciate the opportunities that the world of business can give people.
At the beginning of September 2009, I took a friend to what had been presented to me as the “Best Lahmajun place in Yerevan, Armenia.” That evening, we had the pleasure of meeting the owner–Mr. Sargis Grboyan–who shared the story of his the vision for restaurant “Mer Taghe.” I enjoy meeting entrepreneurs like Sargis, who would, in Kiva Slang, be “graduates” from the organization in the sense that their businesses are already well developed. These are the entrepreneurs who fall in the category in-between needing micro-credit and heading a big business. If everyone had access to credit resources like Mr. Grboyan did, Kiva and the field of microfinance would not be as vital in the fight for alleviating poverty as they are at the moment.
Velizara with the owner of Mer Taghe (Tumanyan Street, Yerevan)
According to Mr. Grboyan, the past 20 years have brought about a positive climate for entrepreneurship in Armenia while the Soviet regime kept the hands of businessmen tied. When his parents moved to Armenia in 1947, Sargis began studying at the local university. In history lectures, he was taught that Capitalism was the worse system and that as young people create families, they must make sure to educate their children of that fact. What he learned from this “brainwashing” was to get “into the blood of a customer”–just like the Communist ideal was supposed to get under the skin of people–and to make sure no client forgets “Mer Taghe.”
Sargis was brought up understanding how to “make money;” but more importantly, he was brought up a good and sociable person. One of his visions is being kind to others, while his everyday priority is to meet new people and help them. He says that if from age 14 you help everyone around you (and most importantly your neighbors), at age 18 one of these people will return your kindness and give you credit to start a business. Sargis says, “If you asked me for money, the first thing I would ask you is ‘Why are you not going to your neighbor’.” You have to seek out the acquaintances that could help you in a hard situation.
It was precisely thanks to such a generous hand that Sargis was able to leave his successful textile business and open a restaurant. Using their own hands, Sargis and his brother, Vazgen, engineered and decorated the place on Tumanyan Street, where they is currently employing 20 people. Sargis thought through every detail from the connection with the kitchen, through the type of seating, to the little Armenian-English wisdom-notes he puts inside the menus:”
“A good name keeps its luster in the dark”
“A fool and his money are soon parted”
“Strike while the iron is hot”
“An honest man’s word is a good as his bond”
I wish all Kiva Borrowers to be able to achieve the ambition, comfort and enjoyment that Sargis Grboyan finds in his work. Part of Kiva’s mission is to provide entrepreneurs from all over the world with the necessaryconnections to develop their business to such an extent. Helping others in a sustainable way is the goal of all of us who commit to the Kiva Community.
Velizara Passajova is serving as a Kiva Fellow with the new field partner Nor Horizon in Yerevan, Armenia.
To view currently fundraising loans from Nor Horizon click here.
To become a member of the “Armenia” lending team click here.
Last Thoughts from Ghana
Memories of Ghana
by Nancy Tuller, KF8, Ghana
I came to Ghana as a Kiva Fellow at a time when the entire country had been experiencing an economic turndown. Since the beginning of this year, the Ghanaian currency has been losing value, prices have been creeping steadily upward, and the fishing and farming industries have been experiencing low outputs. 
Ghanaians, even the relatively few who would be considered “well-to-do”, are feeling the pinch. For the poor, who are the vast majority in the country, it has been more like a gut punch. I have spent a lot of my time talking with loan clients about their lives and the businesses they operate which Kiva lenders have supported. The majority of these clients had taken out loans to “expand their business”, which means that their businesses were under-capitalized. In most cases, their productivity was extremely low, and their capacity to increase productivity was limited by a lack of sufficient inventory, inputs or productive assets that all demanded a cash injection. Repeatedly, clients told me how rising prices had eaten into their profits and decreased their ability to sufficiently re-stock their merchandise, or purchase fish to smoke, or make enough from farming to last until the next harvest season. Even those who had taken out several loans already, and had managed to improve their quality of life in various ways during previous loan cycles did not make substantial profits in the first half of this year. It has been a tougher-than-usual year for poor Ghanaians, and there is no sugar-coating that fact.
That being said, I often found myself wondering what many of these loan clients would have done without the loans that kept them afloat this year. Their situations are dire. Clients are often living so close to the edge that when they lose income, they have to immediately take their children out of school because they can’t afford the school fees due that week. (more…)
Just want to be starting something
By Suzy Marinkovich, KF8
I remember when I was a teenager, I’d awaken in the middle of the night and meander to the kitchen for a glass of water and my dad would be perched there in his chair with a yellow notepad, writing madly about some scientific revelation. He was always so quiet, and his presence would catch me by surprise. The way his hair was completely messed up and his eyes scarily determined, I could swear in these moments he was a mad scientist. He was coming up with a new theory, some new protein to test for in his lab. I always felt that surely, by the aura of madness accompanying him, he was writing down information that would lead to finding a cure for something that I was incapable of understanding due to his annoying inability to use layman’s terms in explanations.
Writing this post was the first time I felt a little of my Dad’s madness, because I wrote this post quickly with just a pen and notebook in hand and a bad case of writer’s cramp. As I wrote it, one of the loan officers asked to borrow my pen four times before I noticed she was speaking to me. I am sure I looked insane to her. I just feel very occupied by this issue, as I am sure a lot of the other Fellows, Kiva staff, lenders, and borrowers themselves feel.
When your heart is invested in someone, it feels instinctive to look for dangers in their path to warn them. I do the same thing for microfinance; I am always pining around our borrower’s stories to unearth obstacles to its success. I’ve come to believe microfinance’s first and most formidable threat is living without ever having had instruction in economics.
By removing certain variables we can make sense of at least a part of this problem.
When small loans don’t work, let’s assume that means one of two things:
A) It didn’t help the borrower financially and they are about the same.
B) It financially hurt the borrower.
Let’s go ahead and remove all extraneous factors – e.g. political strife, health, personal problems, weather, etc. I am aware that presently, it’s virtually impossible to bar these factors in the developing world as we know it. However, for all intents and purposes, let’s work with variables we might be able to control.
As I write this blog post in my notebook, I am seated in the back of a sea of white plastic chairs that hold the many socias (borrowers) at FINCA. We are all watching a Power Point presentation on the subject: “How to know if you are winning or losing in small business.”
FINCA organized this talk because of the following statistic:
The average life span of small businesses in Ayacucho is 18 months.
FINCA Peru lecture on fostering successful business
Necessity Entrepreneurship
By Shereef Zaki, KF9, Perú
On August 22nd the New York Times published the article On to Plan B: Starting a Business describing the unexpected spike of new entrepreneurs emerging from the wreckage of the crisis. They quote the Kauffman foundation and bring the term ‘necessity entrepreneurship’ into the mainstream. And in so doing they articulate one of the misperceptions that surrounds the incentives behind starting a business.
Sometimes I really get the feeling that the talking heads, professors, text-books and pols just don’t get it. And by ‘it’ I mean anything remotely human. To think that greed gets elevated as some sort of miraculously innovative force in the ‘opportunity entrepreneurship’ model, where interest rates adjustments can fix anything, still boggles my mind. As far as I am concerned, nearly all entrepreneurship is ‘necessity entrepreneurship,’ whether in the US, Egypt, Armenia or in Chiclayo, Peru.
Walking to Angelita's Shack
The will to live and make a better life for one’s children are the driving economic forces in most places. People’s businesses are too small to fail — their families depend on them. The phrase ‘necessity is the mother of invention’ contains a truth lost on contemporary economic thought. Luckily it is not lost on Kiva Lenders, whose generosity grows when ‘opportunities’ dry up.
In the end, I cannot help but laugh out of frustration when I read statements like this: “But research on what is known as post-traumatic growth has found that some people become more resilient when faced with adversity, says Shawn Achor, a Harvard researcher. Creativity surges, he says, as they adapt to a new situation.” I read this during the evening, while during the same day I had been out to visit Angelita Loconi De Teque who is 47 and perseveres through ‘adversity’ to make a better life for the 4 children still in her care.
Allah’s Rewards
By Nancy Tuller, KF8, Ghana
As a Kiva Fellow in Ghana, the most rewarding aspect of my fellowship has been meeting people like Khadija, whom I met while visiting microloan clients in a “zogo” (Muslim neighborhood) in Hohoe, in the eastern region of Ghana. Because she touched me deeply, I’d like to share the little I know of her story with you.
Khadija is a beautiful woman who has seen more than her share of hard times. In this photo, you can see her lovely smile, which I had to coax from her after we had quietly chatted for some time. She has had one leg amputated, and must use crutches to move about. She is a single parent of two boys, ages ten and seven, and lives with her mother and a sister in the eastern region of Ghana. As a single parent and an amputee, Khadija almost certainly faces untold prejudices in this cultural context. These facts alone speak of her strength and perseverance in the face of adversity, which have surely aided her in her entrepreneurial efforts. Khadija is a seamstress, and has been for the last 16 years. She just opened her own shop four years ago, however, and this is the major source of income for her household.
All Things Ghanaian
By Nancy Tuller, KF8, Cape Coast, Ghana
Some days as a Kiva Fellow are just about soaking up the culture, and Nyame adom (“by God’s grace”), I have my Kiva counterpart here in Ghana, Ab (
short for Abraham) to help me out with that. For example, how else would I know the difference between kenkey and kente? Some days, as we are traveling to our destination or the electricity has gone out again and all work is halted, we have 30 minutes to one hour sessions on the nuances of various types and textures of kenkey, Ab’s favorite dish made of maize and often served with fish, grasscutter (cane rat), or goat meat stew (and pepper sauce for dipping). He can speak interminably on how to make kenkey, where one can buy the best kenkey, and even what illnesses are cured by two or three (in really serious cases, it could be four) bowls of kenkey. “In fact,” Ab tells me, “Accra kenkey is the best. I cannot live without my kenkey.” (And everyone in our office knows it!) Though he may not speak as passionately about kente, the beautifully hand woven fabric that is highly valued as the cloth of a well-to-do man or woman, he can still describe in great detail the process of the weaving, as well as the symbology often woven into the fabric, that is often made on the village looms we pass on our way to visit loan clients. Ab tells me things I might never know otherwise, such as the common perception here that only tribal chiefs should wear a certain type of white shell as jewelry, and that others who wear it are looked at with a disapproving eye, or that in this part of Ghana, it is believed that if you fish on Tuesdays, you will bring tragedy upon yourself. (more…)
Life on the Mozambique-Swaziland Border
By Cameron Morris-KF8, Mozambique
For the last week and a half I have been working out of the Hluvuku-Adsema office along the bustling Mozambique-Swaziland border in the town of Namaacha, Mozambique. Namaacha is nestled in the Libombo mountains, boasts a plenitude of colonial architecture and has extremely erratic weather (please believe that it gets mighty cold in Mozambique). During the near fortnight that I’ve been here I have been continually impressed by the ingenuity of the international businessmen and women that ply their trade along the border.
Many of us claim to be polyglots or to engage in or have some knowledge of international business, but what does that really mean in practice? We have pedantically learned languages in school, have spent decently protracted periods of time abroad, have had conference calls with our foreign offices or flown to foreign lands to conduct business in English, the commercial lingua franca. (more…)
Typical
by Joel Carlman, KF8
As a parting shot from my Kiva Fellowship, I put this short video together to represent what a “typical” Kenyan woman’s life is like. It doesn’t even begin to do justice to any of the great Kiva borrowers, but it’s at least my best attempt at immortalizing all of them! Enjoy.
Joel Carlman recently finished his time as a Kiva Fellow with Kisumu Medical & Education Trust in Kenya.
