Small grassroots businesses, such as coffee farmer cooperatives and artisan associations are engines for sustainable development and poverty alleviation in rural communities in the developing world. Considered too small and risky for mainstream banks and too large for microfinance, these grassroots businesses are caught in the “missing middle”; they cannot access the capital they need to grow and sustain their operations.
Root Capital addresses this market failure through an innovative lend more...

Seeking to address high unemployment rates among youth in Bolivia, where nearly half the population is under 18, Pro Mujer is providing young people with basic business training and credit so they can succeed as entrepreneurs. In early 2008 Pro Mujer began rolling out the loan in El Alto, a poverty-stricken city adjacent to La Paz, and next year will make the loan available in other parts of the country.

“Adolescents and young adults from poor families here struggle to find decent employme more...

When farmers get access to credit and reliable storage facilities for their grain, it gives them the option to sell it when they can get the best price. The warehouse receipt system, introduced in some districts of Tanzania through an IFAD-supported programme, is now being introduced throughout the country by the government.

'Sa-Dhan’s mission is to build the field of community development finance in India to help its member and associate institutions to better serve low-income households, particularly women, in both rural and urban India, in their quest for establishing stable livelihoods and improving quality of life. Founded as the Association of Community Development Finance Institutions by SEWA Bank, BASIX, Dhan Foundation, FWWB, MYRADA, RGVN, SHARE and PRADAN in 1999, Sa-Dhan's membership has grown to 229 wi more...

Access to financial services is still very limited in Sub-Saharan Africa, despite raising awareness of the role that financial services play in helping poor families manage their precarious lives. With just 1 in 5 households with access to formal financial services, the Sub-Saharan African suffers from one of the lowest rates of access in the world.

A recent CGAP survey found that while funders enthusiastically support access to finance to improve the lives of Africa’s, but there are geog more...

Mercy Corps is committed to exploring cutting-edge ideas and making an even broader array of financial services accessible to the world's poor. They envision creating a seamless web of products that serve everyone, from the poorest borrower to the richest, with the full range of financial services that signal equal access to economic opportunity.

According to the authors, growth in The Gambia has not been pro-poor. Weak productivity and the low quality of employment explain why. They recommend policies to increase the supply of credit to the economy, particularly to employment-intensive sectors.

Este One Pager pone en duda la validez de las mediciones de la pobreza de “un dólar al día” y “dos dólares al día” en América Latina. El autor sostiene que hay otros métodos que mejor capturan el estado de la pobreza.

In this Microfinance Gateway Highlight, Intellecap provides an overview of the active microfinance scene in the world's largest democracy - from its origins in Self-Help Groups and MFIs to today's hot investment opportunities.

Matt Flannery, cofounder of Kiva.org, a website that partners with microfinance institutions to allow people to loan money to entrepreneurs in the developing world, discusses the microfinance industry and its growing popularity among large financial institutions and the development community. He says the practice of providing financial services to the poor is not necessarily going to increase a country’s economic growth rate. Despite the high costs associated with making small loans, large fin more...