Archive for October, 2011
“Fundación Paraguaya al Mundo”: 5K to Tanzania
By Alba Castillo, KF 16, Paraguay
Before this month, I had never ran an organized race. But when I heard of Fundación Paraguaya’s 5K to celebrate their new initiative in Tanzania, I was in! Yes, I said Tanzania – over 6,000 miles away from FP’s headquarters in Asunción.
Update from the Field: Expanding the Reach of Microfinance, Downsizing Development + Why We Kiva
Compiled by Kathrin Gerner, KF16, Rwanda
This week, you have no fewer than 14 new articles to choose from on the Kiva fellows blog: Let the fellows take you along on borrower visits across the world. Learn how Kiva field partners expand the reach of microfinance in Rwanda, fill the microfinance donut hole in Sierra Leone and improve social performance in Uganda. Find out what poverty is like in urban Tajikistan and rural Burkina Faso. Get inspired by one of the creative ways to bring renewable energy to the developing world in the form of a soccer ball. And finally, watch a video of “Why We Kiva” to get a glimpse of why Kiva fellows jump at the opportunity to be thrown half way around the world to work with Kiva’s many local field partners.
Continue Reading 31 October 2011 at 02:49 Kathrin Gerner 5 comments
Video Blog: “Why We Kiva” – Kiva Fellows Around the World
Compiled by Mariela Cedeño, KF16, Bolivia.
Wondering why Kiva Fellows jump at the opportunity to be thrown half way around the world to work with Kiva’s many local Field Parnters? Well, this little video should give you a small glimpse of “Why We Kiva”.
Mariela Cedeño is part of Kiva Fellows 16th Class, serving with CIDRE in Cochabamba, Bolivia. Cows have become her new favorite thing on earth…Llamas are also moving up the list. Please support CIDRE‘s hard-working entrepreneurs by making a loan today and join the Friends of CIDRE/Amigos de CIDRE lending team to stay involved!
La Réalité de L’Afrique
By Allison Moomey, KF16, Burkina Faso
I spent last weekend in a small village about 10km outside of Banfora (a small city about 6.5 hours from where I live in Ouagadougou) with some incredibly welcoming and generous Peace Corps volunteers. As often as I get annoyed by bugs, heat, and unreliable internet, I live a pretty charmed Burkinabé life in Ouaga. Staying in a village without electricity or running water was a wake-up call to the realities of life here. I didn’t do any of the hard work like getting water or biking products to market that most residents do each day. I lived like a pretty privileged guest. But I was still exhausted after just 48 hours. I can’t even begin to imagine what life would be like as a resident with only tôt (nutritionally empty starch) to eat, daily trips to the pump for water, and a dirt floor to sleep on every night. Although not as rural, these same challenges are a daily reality for many of Micro Start’s borrowers. The weekend was full of lessons, and recognizing my lack of hardcore-ness was only the beginning.
- The lack of infrastructure means gorgeous nature is still intact!
Mysteries, Geoglyphs + too-good-to-be-true Kiva Borrowers
When I arrived in famous Nazca, Peru last week to complete some borrower visits, my mind was not on the celebrated and mysterious Nazca Lines but on the mystery of Caja Rural Señor de Luren borrower Gaby, who repaid her entire loan a mere month after disbursement.
I was checking in on Gaby’s loan as part of my borrower verification (BV) for Kiva Partner Caja Rural. The borrower verification item on a Kiva Fellow’s workplan always has us feeling anxious. One of the BV’s key objectives is to ensure transparency of loan repayment from Kiva Field Partners and potentially unearth any foul play within the Kiva partnership. Obviously, most of the time this is not the case; Kiva works with accredited and trustworthy microfinance institutions whose missions selflessly aid in the betterment of clients’ lives. But nevertheless, when I see something as rare as full repayment on the first repayment date, I can’t help but wonder…
Continue Reading 28 October 2011 at 04:00 Kate Bennett 1 comment
The Second Bottom Line and BRAC Uganda’s Gold
by Andrew Huelsenbeck, K16 Kiva Fellow, BRAC Uganda
The Second Bottom Line
One thing that’s gotten very popular with microfinance institutions (MFIs) lately is measuring success based on what is called a double bottom line. For a long time, the only bottom line for many MFIs was financials, but industry experts began to realize that looking good on paper did not amount to having any real social impact. This is why some MFIs have begun to use a second bottom line – social performance – as an additional metric for success.
What is social performance exactly? It is how an MFI is translating its core mission into practice. The success of this can be gauged in basically two ways: (1) by examining the actual impact of services on clients and (2) by examining the systems an MFI is using to optimize its impact on clients.
Among MFIs, a very common means of measuring the social impact of services is the Grameen Foundation’s Progress out of Poverty Index (PPI). The way the PPI works is by measuring the poverty levels of groups and individuals based on certain country-specific criteria like access to water, medicine, shelter etc. By examining changes in the PPI over time, MFIs are able to better determine their clients’ needs, which programs are most effective, how quickly clients leave poverty, and what helps them to move out of poverty faster.
The other main way of assessing social performance focuses less on the actual impact of services and more on MFIs’ management of the systems that optimize impact. This kind of management is commonly called social performance management (SPM). The success of SPM is based on an MFI’s ability to do mainly three things: (1) set clear social objectives, (2) monitor the progress towards achieving those objectives, and (3) use the insights from monitoring to improve overall performance and impact.
One of the major organizations responsible for establishing assessments and best practice guidelines relating to how MFIs achieve these three things is called the Social Performance Task Force (SPTF). The SPTF was birthed in 2005 when the CGAP, the Argidius Foundation and the Ford Foundation brought together leaders from various social performance initiatives in the microfinance industry to come to a consensus on a common social performance framework and an action plan to implement it. The SPTF has worked very closely with CERISE (the creator of the social performance assessment tool Kiva uses for its partners), and has recently been doing a lot of work in Uganda.
BRAC Uganda’s Gold SPM Award
Many Ugandan MFIs are part of a larger organization called the Association of Microfinance Institutions of Uganda (AMFIU). In the past year or so, AMFIU has begun to seriously encourage social performance management among its constituents. With the guidance of the SPTF and with funding from the Ford Foundation, the organization has held training sessions, published instructional guides, and not too long ago, held its first ever Social Performance Management Awards here in Kampala.
The event was huge. All of the big players were there: PRIDE, Opportunity, Finance Trust, Habitat for Humanity, EMESCO and more. The Ugandan Commissioner of Microfinance and the president of AMFIU were also in attendance and helped to present the awards to the MFIs that have really excelled in SPM. Many bronzes and silvers were handed out, but BRAC Uganda, the main MFI I am working with, took home the only gold.
Mr. Ariful Islam, the (former) Country Representative of BRAC Uganda, displays BRAC's Gold SPM Award
BRAC Uganda is an incredible organization. In just six years, with the help of the MasterCard Foundation, Kiva, Unicef and other major partners, BRAC has become a microfinance titan in Uganda. It currently has over 1,800 employees working at 114 branches, has dispersed more than $71 million in loans, and has touched the lives of nearly 2 million of Uganda’s poor.
What’s more impressive, though, is BRAC’s dedication to the second bottom line. Its mission is clear and simple: to alleviate poverty by empowering the poor to bring about change in their own lives. BRAC has achieved this not only by bringing financial services to some of the remotest regions in Uganda, but also by starting and scaling up health, agriculture, education and adolescent empowerment programs.
Many systems at BRAC are set up to ensure that clients are actually benefiting from these programs. More than half of the time, program managers are out in the field interacting with clients; the 15-member Monitoring Department continually evaluates programs to prevent mismanagement and misappropriation of funds; and BRAC Uganda’s unique Research and Evaluation Unit regularly conducts studies on the relevance and effectiveness of BRAC’s operations.
The research unit at BRAC Uganda is also currently working with AMFIU and the Grameen Foundation to promote the use of the PPI among other major MFIs in Uganda. The poverty index (or scorecard) was originally developed by a lead BRAC International researcher using national household survey data in Uganda. The Grameen Foundation adopted the idea, and worked with BRAC to update the index using newer data from many different countries. Now, the two organizations are using the PPI to improve social performance in Uganda and all over the world.
Andrew Huelsenbeck is a Kiva Fellow currently working in Kampala with BRAC Uganda. To learn more about BRAC, please visit their Kiva Partner Page. If you are interested in helping to empower one or more of BRAC’s many wonderful entrepreneurs, you can join the Friends of BRAC Uganda lending team or check out new BRAC Uganda loans on Kiva.org. Happy lending!
This Is Urban Poverty in Tajikistan
By Chris Paci, KF16, Tajikistan
“Be careful,” called Rahim from somewhere above my head. It was pitch black, and I felt for each stair with the toe of my shoe, slowly working my way up to where Rahim stood. Shards of fallen concrete snapped beneath my boots.
Rahim was standing in front of a door and fiddling with his keys. “Sorry, we have no lightbulbs in the stairwell. It’s difficult to see,” he apologized, just as the lock snapped open with a crack that echoed down the dark stairwell. Without so much as a pause, he swept me inside his apartment and sat me down on a sagging armchair with a stained floral pattern. “Please, make yourself comfortable! I’ll be right back with some tea,” he said, disappearing abruptly.
Microfinance by Land or by Sea
By Kate Bennett, KF16, Peru
I spent last week at the beach. But from my resiliently pasty skin, you wouldn’t have guessed it. For better or worse, I wasn’t in Camaná, Perú to suntan and lay by the ocean, but in fact to visit borrowers with Kiva Field Partner Caja Rural Señor de Luren….
Continue Reading 27 October 2011 at 06:00 Kate Bennett 4 comments
Downsizing Development: How a Soccer Ball Could Change the World
Lauren Barra, KF16 Kenya
As several of my colleagues have outlined here, here and here the power of simplicity is particularly evident in microfinance. These borrowers’ success makes me wonder – how else can “thinking small” translate to big changes in international development?
A few weeks ago I got my answer. My roommate Amy emailed with exciting news – “I got the internship!!” After weeks of cover letters, interviews, and language proficiency tests, Amy secured a marketing internship with sOccket, an innovative new social business focused on bringing renewable energy to the developing world. As one reporter noted,
Every great once in a while, you come across something that makes you slap your head and say, “That’s…just…brilliant.”
Continue Reading 26 October 2011 at 22:00 Lauren Barra 3 comments
More Than a Simple Find/Replace Operation: Changing CREDIT to Kredit
By Dave Weber, KF16 Cambodia
The CREDIT MFI in Cambodia is in the midst of rolling out their name and logo change to Kredit Microfinance. Unfortunately, it’s not as simple as a Microsoft Word find/replace operation!
Continue Reading 26 October 2011 at 13:00 bluepotatokiva 2 comments
Pride & Poverty: A Photo Essay of Kiva Borrowers in Georgia
Ask any Kiva Fellow what the best part of their job is, and invariably you will hear, “Meeting Kiva Borrowers and hearing their stories.” It’s an incredible honor to be invited into borrowers homes and businesses to witness firsthand how a Kiva loan has helped to change and improve their lives. Spend a little time getting to know a borrower and you’ll be struck by two things- first, how amazingly hard they work and second, how proud they are to share the progress or product a Kiva loan has helped them to develop.
Continue Reading 26 October 2011 at 05:54 DJ Forza 12 comments
In Sickness and in Health: An MFI’s commitment to its clients in times of need
By Andrea Ramirez, KF16 El Salvador.
El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala were hit recently by non-stop rain. Ten days of rain to be precise. Here in El Salvador the areas affected were mostly those close to rivers and the coast. In a country as small as El Salvador, that means pretty much 70 percent of the country was affected. Based on government estimates, El Salvador was the country that was hit the hardest. More than 55,000 people have been left out of their homes due to the floods, and 34 people died. The government still has no estimates of how much the reconstruction efforts will cost.
I am lucky to have been living in a city like San Miguel, where the water flows down the streets rather than getting stuck and into people’s houses. However, many of the communities that Fundacion Campo works with were not so lucky. As soon as the water started to rise in some of the communities that are known for having this type of issue with natural disasters, Fundacion Campo came up with a plan to help.
Part of Fundacion Campo's donations
First, Fundacion Campo’s employees wanted to contribute. So everyone donated what they could in terms of money, clothes, food, and other basic items that the communities told us they needed. Then, the management team decided to dedicate some of the institution’s resources to buy food in bulk, which would be delivered to three of the most hard-hit communities. These communities are usually out of the radar in terms of international aid. Fundacion Campo is considering other ways to help their clients too. They are looking into refinancing the loans of those affected by the floods (mostly fishermen and farmers). Some of their clients , such as fishermen, have been out of work for 16 days now, but will be able to go back to work later this week. Others, those who work the land, are out of work indefinitely as the soil and their crops have been completely flooded and ruined.
A loan officer from F. Campo unloading the goods to be donated
After unloading the two trucks full of food, we decided to really see what was the damage done by the rain. We embarked on a couple of canoes, and moved across the water - down what would’ve normally have been one of the main streets.
Makeshift dock at one of the communities served by Fundacion Campo
Flooded houses
To protect their belongings, people hung them from the ceilings of their homes
Andrea Ramirez is a Kiva Fellow serving in El Salvador with Fundacion Campo. Now more than ever, please consider supporting Fundacion Campo’s work by joining our lending team – or even better, make a loan to one of our awesome clients. Help Fundacion Campo help their clients get their life back after the floods.
The Donut Hole Conundrum + Mamoud’s Story
By Tejal Desai, KF16, Sierra Leone
Earlier this year, a Kiva fellow in KF14, David McNeill, wrote about his interaction with a Sierra Leonean taxi driver, and addressed a hot issue in microfinance: the financial donut hole. The driver asked David what type of work he was doing in Sierra Leone, and after David mentioned he was involved with microcredit, the driver expressed, “Ah, that is for women.” In his post, David explains how the driver was mostly right: why the microfinance industry concentrates on lending mostly to women, although there are still a small percentage of men who are eligible to receive loans. He continues to explain that the microfinance industry generally targets the poorest of the poor, this “bottom of the pyramid,” but leaves out those who fall in between: the people that are financially overqualified for microcredit, but too poor to receive a bank loan — resulting in the donut hole conundrum. His post makes it clear that microfinance has a long way to go until it can reach all levels of poverty. During my fellowship at BRAC Sierra Leone, however, I have learned about a particular product that is proving to be a small but effective means to fill that rather large donut hole: the small enterprise loan.
Continue Reading 24 October 2011 at 13:00 Tejal Desai 3 comments
Going the Distance: Expanding the Reach of Microfinance in Rwanda
By Whitney Webb, KF16, Rwanda
One of the biggest challenges of providing access to financial services to those living in poverty is the actual logistics of expanding the services into some of the most remote areas of the world. 92% of Rwandans live in rural areas. During my first field visit, I visited a small village near the border of Tanzania. After meeting several first time borrowers and hearing about their challenges and strong hopes for the future, we drove out onto the unpredictable mud roads.
Continue Reading 24 October 2011 at 08:49 Whitney Webb 6 comments
Updates from the Field: Green Loans, Dark Alleys + On-the-Ground Footage of it All
Compiled by Kate Bennett, KF16, Peru
Want a fresh look at Kiva clients on-the-ground? This week fellows share stories and mixed-media that bring us directly into the cities, homes and pulperías of borrowers. From the marketplace in Bolivia, to the streets of Guayaquil, to the dumps of Kenya, we learn about the challenges of working in developing countries and the strategies loan officers and Fellows can use to mitigate them. Not to mention we can see the work of Kiva fellows and Kiva Field Partners in Cambodia, Honduras and Bolivia in living color. What’s even better than reading a post by a Kiva Fellow? Seeing what we see in the field for yourself!
Continue Reading 24 October 2011 at 02:00 Kate Bennett 2 comments
Girlie’s Peanut Butter: Borrower Verification in the Philippines
By: Jill Hall, Manila,Philippines
As I stepped out in the oppressive humidity of a Manila morning, my spirit was excited and ready to leave the protection of CCT head office’s wonderful air conditioning because this was the day I got to do another borrower verification.This day’s journey is particularly exciting because the reward at the end of the two-hour bus side in Metro Manila traffic, is Caloocan City, a place where nature begins to meet houses and instead of high rises and smog you plunge in to lush green hills and palm trees. It is there that I will find the lady that makes peanut butter.
Continue Reading 23 October 2011 at 21:54 The Musings of a Sponge 6 comments
Loans Available Here –>
By Mariela Cedeño, KF16, Bolivia.
Every time I walk into one of CIDRE’s offices in Bolivia, I always stop and take a look at their street sign. I’m not sure why, it’s a weird habit that reminds me of where I am, who I am working with, and the amazing opportunity that has been afforded to me as a Kiva Fellow. This past week, however, when walking into one of CIDRE’s branch offices I thought to myself, “I see this sign and I know that it means ‘loans available here’, but how do entrepreneurs know that they can get access to tool at CIDRE that could help change their lives?” Microfinace, after all, has as much to do with access to credit as it has to with anything, so I started asking around….how do people find out about CIDRE?
CIDRE's Office in Colomi
Word of Mouth
In talking to one of the veteran loan officers, her first response and a response that has been echoed many times since was simply: word of mouth. For decades now, some of CIDRE’s loan officers have been working in specific neighborhoods, learning about various communities’ productive activities, and offering a way to help those businesses thrive. More than that, they have become trusted community members by getting to know their clients and their families, listening to their hardships, and celebrating in their triumphs. So once one community member becomes a CIDRE client, it is highly likely that they will spread the word….in comes Francisca.
Francisca With Her Cows
Francisca has been a CIDRE client for sometime, so when her community started thinking of a way to grow their dairy businesses, Francisca suggested CIDRE could help put their plans into action. A few weeks later, 15 had committed to the plan. Together, they each took out a loan to help purchase a refrigerated milk tank from which the group’s daily milk production could be picked up by Bolivia’s largest dairy company, Pil Andina. With this direct connection to Pil, they no longer have to piecemeal irregular sales together through family and neighbors but rather have a steady source of income.
But now you’re thinking, ok, but when those star clients aren’t around to get their neighbors to CIDRE, what happens? Well CIDRE goes to them.
Spreading the Gospel of CIDRE
In Colomi, the small branch office has 3 loan officers, 4,000 inhabitants, and a lot of productive territory to cover. In order to help grow CIDRE’s presence in the small town, loan officers from the central office and a nearby brach traveled to Colomi to spread the gospel of CIDRE. On Colomi’s Dia de Feria (main market day), 6 visiting loan officers set up a small booth in the midst of all the action and got to work.
Dia de Feria, Colomi
After setting up CIDRE’s “Loans Available Here” booth, ensuring that enticing cumbias were playing on the car stereo, and stapling copies of Colomi loan officer business cards to CIDRE flyers, we were ready to go.
The CIDRE Crew
One by one the loan officers approached market antendees and gave out flyers and cards.
Getting to Know CIDRE
Some were already familiar with credit and asked specific questions regarding interest rates and loans products.
Reviewing Loan Types, Terms, and Rates
Some looked very confused…
CIDRE, what?
In the end, the loan officers handed out a hundreds of flyers and gave a lot of credit talks. We don’t know how many will become CIDRE clients in the future, but we do know that some promised to at least stop by.
Mariela Cedeño is part of Kiva’s 16th Class of Fellows serving with CIDRE in Bolivia. Cows are her new favorite thing on earth. Please support CIDRE‘s hard-working entrepreneurs by making a loan today and join the Friends of CIDRE/Amigos de CIDRE lending team to stay involved!
Going Green? Overcoming Cultural Barriers to Promote Green Loans (Part 1)
By Claire Markham, KF16, Kenya
In the developed world, the recent increased attention to global warming and the importance of environmental preservation and restoration efforts is something that’s hard to ignore. In Kenya, I have found this is not necessarily the case in my experiences so far. When the borrowers that we work with so often have to worry about ensuring there is enough food on the table or money for school fees, adding the responsibility of being conscious of their environmental impact can be a hard notion to sell. How can an MFI break through these obstacles and implement a successful green and water loan program when so much of the population, including our borrowers, aren’t environmentally aware? This two-part blog post will attempt to answer this question.
Continue Reading 20 October 2011 at 10:15 clairemarkham 4 comments
Video Blog: ODEF’s First Kiva Borrower
By Sandra Pina, KF16, Honduras
For the past six weeks I have been working in San Pedro Sula with Kiva’s newest Honduran Field Partner, ODEF Financiera, S.A. During the on-boarding process, I get to witness many of the organization’s “Kiva firsts.” First Kiva presentation to staff, first training sessions with loan officers, first Kiva Borrower profile, first month of repayment reporting – you get the idea.
About a week ago, ODEF posted it’s first borrower profile on Kiva.org. Doña María owns a pulpería in Naco-Santa Barbara where she sells soda, snacks, and dairy products. Her $550 loan was fully funded in 2 days, 22 hours and 9 minutes.
Ever wonder what it takes to get a borrower profile onto Kiva? Check out the footage below to see how ODEF tackled its first one.
Continue Reading 19 October 2011 at 10:24 pinayprestamos 4 comments
What´s Easier Than Getting Robbed in Guayaquil?
By Emmanuel M. von Arx, KF 16, Ecuador
As much a therapy session as a blog entry, this is the narrative of a recent robbery incident in Guayaquil: It happened two hours ago and my co-workers and I can still feel the shock in our bones. This day had begun like a normal day: At 7.30am Rubi Chaca – the Kiva Coordinator of Banco D-MIRO -, her 16-year old intern Joel Kenny Matias, and I had met outside of the bank´s headquarters, where we were picked up by Roberto, the official driver of the bank. He drove us to the branch office of Guasmo where we gave a training session to the local loan officers, reminding them about Kiva and explaining to them why it is so important that they keep finding micro-entrepreneurs who agree to be listed with their name and photo on Kiva´s website.
Continue Reading 18 October 2011 at 16:00 Emmanuel von Arx 9 comments
Making Room for Charity: Gift Giving to the Poorest Clients at CREDIT
By Dave Weber, KF16 Cambodia
CREDIT does more than administer loans and savings products to help alleviate poverty. An initiative of theirs called VSU distributes gifts to their poorest clients. Read on and watch a video of the gift distribution.
Continue Reading 17 October 2011 at 09:00 bluepotatokiva 4 comments
Updates from the Field: Kiva-style Microfinance, Reggaeton + a Journey though the Commercial Jungle
This week Fellows look at the questions surrounding microfinance, or perhaps more specifically, Kiva-style microfinance: what is Christian microfinance in Rwanda? Where are these borrower profiles actually coming from? What is the everyday mentality of a Kiva micro-borrower? What’s this about Field Partners in the United States? What above-and-beyond services are our Field Partners offering Kiva Clients? And the ten-thousand dollar questions- “Why micro loans; Why small business; and Why poverty?” Through anecdotes in the field and insight from borrowers, this week Fellows try to give us a little illumination.
Continue Reading 17 October 2011 at 02:00 Kate Bennett 6 comments
Why micro loans; Why small business; and Why poverty
Eric Rindal – KF16 – La Paz, Bolivia
Another day, another dollar lost as a volunteer. The first part of my second Fellowship has gone by tremendously fast. I only have two more months left of what will be my seven months as a Kiva Fellow. No longer do I feel like a volunteer, this is now my way of life. At this juncture, after leaving Sierra Leone and entering Bolivia, I ask three questions: Why micro loans; Why small business; and Why poverty.
As a Fellow these questions encapsulate most of what I think about. In short, I want to know why things are the way they are. Always surrounded by questions of how to cultivate economic development, I am finding few answers but am still encouraged. Rather, I see a conglomerate of ideas that help make sense of volunteering within economic development.
Continue Reading 16 October 2011 at 02:00 erindal 3 comments
New Orleans: A Developing Country in America?
by Rebecca Corey, KF 9 & 16, New Orleans, USA
“This isn’t America. New Orleans is like a developing country.”
In the four weeks I’ve lived in New Orleans, I’ve heard this statement from nearly ten different people.
(…)
So if the United States is a developed country, then why does Kiva have a presence here? Once a country is considered “developed” (modernized, industrialized, democratized, capitalized), then people want to wipe their hands, pat each other on the back, and say the work is done. Institutionalized greed and inequality are given the leeway to exist, because we become convinced we have achieved development and reached an endpoint. The action is completed. Stasis reached. Shouldn’t we be satisfied? By bringing Kiva City to the United States, Kiva has made a brave statement about what development means and who can benefit from it.
Continue Reading 14 October 2011 at 15:42 Rebecca Corey 6 comments
A Day in the Life Part I: Kiva Coordinator
By Allison Moomey, KF16, Burkina Faso
I was a fan of Kiva long before I realized there were real people who make those profiles miraculously appear on Kiva’s website. Likely, you’re a bit more aware. Or perhaps you’re like me, and you’ve just never thought about it. If so, this is like the Santa revelation… there aren’t gnomes behind the screen, but instead hard-working, committed groups of people. Either way, this is the first in a series of posts dedicated to them and all that they do!
There are so many people behind the posting of a single profile, and this is just part one in a series of posts to give each a bit of exposure. We’ll begin with the person running the Kiva show at the MFI-level: the Kiva Coordinator (in Kiva-speak, the KC). Now, this position looks different at each MFI. At some larger partners, the KC may solely be doing Kiva work. At many- like Kiva’s fabulous first partner in Burkina Faso, Micro Start- it’s just one of many things on his/her plate.
Continue Reading 14 October 2011 at 07:47 Allison Moomey 4 comments
Meeting Karsinah: Maximizing My Social Return on Investment
By Laurie Young, KF 16, Indonesia
For you mathematicians out there, what’s the probability that out of the 43 VFI borrowers that were on Kiva.org at the time a random sample of 10 borrowers was drawn for visits that I would need to make, one of the selections would be one of the three groups I had lent to? Well, obviously good enough that it happened! Imagine my excitement when I received my Borrower Verification (BV) sample and saw one of the groups in my Kiva portfolio!
This is my story of meeting Karsinah, a Kiva borrower that I had chosen to lend to a few months ago and how Kiva loans provide a social return on investment to lenders.
Continue Reading 13 October 2011 at 03:00 laurie4485 11 comments
High-tops in The Commercial Jungle: The Life of a Shoe Salesman
by Jim Burke, KF16, Nicaragua
Marcial Salvador selling high-tops
Mercado Oriental spans 60 city blocks and is the largest in Central America. The market is a jungle of stalls, pushcarts, alleyways and low hanging clothes, fruits, and shoes. It’s a full sensory experience that is almost numbing in its frenetic energy. Flies on meats next to sexy new hair products, car parts and phone calls from the same vendor, sweet smells of fresh baked bread and shoe polish, this is where Marcial Salvador sells shoes.
Marcial Salvador has been working in this market in varying capacities for the last 45 years. He is a model borrower at AFODENIC and is on his 4rth Kiva Loan! (more…)
Wrap your arms around me
By Marcus Berkowitz, KF16, Ecuador
Imagine yourself stepping outside of your tomato-colored house and onto a peaceful street, steeply hung over a mid-sized Ecuadorian town nestled in a lush valley. It’s nearly silent as you walk to the bus stop. You can see the center of town bustling below you. The giant Mt. Chimborazo in the distance and the smaller range just in front of it block the harshness of the early morning sun, casting a soft light on the quiet countryside.
This peace lasts no more than a couple of minutes before it is loudly shattered by the shouting of the fare official of the bright red bus screaming towards you with no intention to stop, loudly blaring from its many loudspeakers the same song as yesterday (indeed, as every day). So it begins!
Continue Reading 12 October 2011 at 08:12 marcusofulano 3 comments
Say a Little Prayer for the Portfolio: 5 Questions about Christian Microfinance in Rwanda
By Kathrin Gerner and Whitney Webb, KF16, Rwanda
Before coming to Rwanda, we both had no idea what it meant to work for a Christian bank. Islamic banking, yes, that is something we had heard about before. But Christian banking?
To find out more, we interviewed the staff at our host microfinance institutions, Amasezerano Community Banking, Vision Finance Company and Urwego Opportunity Bank, and asked them five questions.
Continue Reading 10 October 2011 at 03:00 Kathrin Gerner 5 comments
Update from the Field: Loan Use, Agriculture Loans + Stuff Kiva Fellows Like
Compiled by Kathrin Gerner, KF16, Rwanda
This week on the Kiva fellows blog: Hop on a poda-poda or an okada to try out an adventurous way to get around Sierra Leone. Find out why loan use in Tajikistan is not as straightforward as you may think. Learn how the principle of “trust but verify” is applied in Georgia. Explore the clever efforts of an Ecuadorian Kiva partner to craft an agricultural loan product that is appropriate to farmers’ needs. Welcome Kiva’s new field partner, VisionFund Cambodia. Learn how village banking works in Ecuador.
Continue Reading 10 October 2011 at 02:00 Kathrin Gerner 8 comments
