Micro-Lending

I just became a micro-lender. I have invested in a Taxi business in Uganda and a market stall selling sunglasses in Mexico. The lending institute is called Kiva and is run by a few idealists out on the West Coast, who broker interest free micro-credits through their website. So far they had a 100% payback rate. After Muhammad Yuns and his Grameen Bank in Bangladesh won the Nobel Peace Prize Frontline World ran a feature about Kiva.. Which gotten them so much interest that they had to limit the amount you can invest, so they don’t run out of projects to support too soon.

Funny how one picks the projects to invest in. In the report they said that African projects get the most response, since there’s such great interest right now. Agricultural projects of course go well. The Taxi business needs their loan for a new engine, because their Toyota mini-bus always breaks down. Seemed urgent, but hasn’t gotten that many responses yet. I guess, because nobody likes cab drivers. Same goes for the rental businesses in the program, sicne everybody tends to see their landlord as the enemy. And the sunglass business? Hey, style can be essential too. Well alright, I picked that one for sentimental reasons, because it’s in Queretaro, where I went for one of my first hard news stories, covering the civil war in Guatemala and Queretaro was the town, where the rebels and the government held some meetings to discuss peace.

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Become a micro-lender at Kiva.org