If you’ve visited Kiva.org recently, you may have gotten this message “Thanks Kiva Lenders!…You’ve funded EVERY business on the site!!” It’s hard to remember a time (if ever?) that a charitable organization has said that to an enthusiastic donor.

Kiva.org is a way for a donor to make a small loan (microcredit) to an entrepreneur in a developing country. Kiva’s popularity sometimes makes it hard to keep up with the demand. But why? Kiva goes through a process of vetting their potential entrepreneurs from developing countries, and sometimes logistics (like getting a digital camera to the area that the loan applicant is in) is to blame.

It’s great to see that there are so many philanthropists out there interested in giving business people from developing countries a boost.

However, global development is a complicated issue—and microcredit is only one way to help those in poverty. The way we craft our policies has a huge impact—which is why it’s so important to tell our candidates that global development is important to us.

Watch this video to see Maria’s story and how microcredit may help her:

Read the article from NY Times Magazine here.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 29th, 2008 at 8:57 pm and is filed under Global Development, Global Poverty, Microcredit. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.