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Full-Text Articles in Business
Challenges To Microfinance Commercialization, Anita Campion
Challenges To Microfinance Commercialization, Anita Campion
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
This paper was presented to audiences in Vietnam, Indonesia, Singapore and the Philippines through a World Bank multimedia distance education program in October 2001. The presentation addressed some of the core obstacles to microfinance commercialization, defined here as the application of market-based principles to providing financial services to the poor. The paper discusses some of the challenges to microfinance commercialization, such as inappropriate donor subsidies, poor regulation and supervision, and limited management capacity of microfinance institutions. Given the initial target audience of primarily World Bank employees, the paper concludes with a discussion on what donor can do to move microfinance …
Front Matter, Journal Of Microfinance
Front Matter, Journal Of Microfinance
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
No abstract provided.
Evaluation And Microenterprise Programs In The United States, Mark Schreiner
Evaluation And Microenterprise Programs In The United States, Mark Schreiner
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
Microenterprise programs attempt to help poor people start or strengthen small businesses. Funding and political support have grown rapidly. Is microenterprise a good use of scarce development funds? Unfortunately, most evaluations have been case studies in what not to do. Because benefits and costs cannot be measured completely nor with perfect certainty, rigorous evaluations should support their necessarily subjective judgements with logic and explicit assumptions. The usefulness of an evaluation lies not in its (apparent) incontrovert-ibility but rather in its clarity of assumptions and in its openness to meaningful review and critique.
A Symposium On Savings-Led Microfinance And The Rural Poor, Jeffrey Ashe
A Symposium On Savings-Led Microfinance And The Rural Poor, Jeffrey Ashe
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
No abstract provided.
Unfinished Business: The Need For More Effective Microfinance Exit Monitering, James G. Copestake
Unfinished Business: The Need For More Effective Microfinance Exit Monitering, James G. Copestake
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
High rates of exit remain the "Achilles heel" of many micro-finance organizations. After reviewing definitional issues, the paper explores how exit rates adversely affect both their commercial and social objectives. It then reviews case studies of exit monitoring based on routine, questionnaire based and focus group methods, making detailed suggestions as to how data collection, analysis and reporting can be improved.
Savings And Credit For U.S. Microenterprises : Integrating Individual Development Accounts And Loans For Microenterprise, Caroline E. Glackin, Eliza G. Mahony
Savings And Credit For U.S. Microenterprises : Integrating Individual Development Accounts And Loans For Microenterprise, Caroline E. Glackin, Eliza G. Mahony
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
This paper provides a framework for the integration of two asset-building instruments, Individual Development Accounts (IDAs) and loans for microenterprise. Initially, it provides an overview of the emergence of the asset-based approach to poverty alleviation in the U.S. context and the evolution of IDAs and microenterprise development (MED). Then, it evaluates the potential role of IDAs in reducing risk using conventional lending criteria. The paper summarizes the findings of initial research on integrated programs and highlights four case studies. Finally, the paper provides some preliminary observations regarding potential benefits and challenges of the integrated approach and proposes an agenda for …
Pact's Women's Empowerment Program In Nepal : A Savings- And Literacy- Led Alternative To Financial Building, Jeffrey Ashe, Lisa Parrott Lparrot@Freefromhunger.Org
Pact's Women's Empowerment Program In Nepal : A Savings- And Literacy- Led Alternative To Financial Building, Jeffrey Ashe, Lisa Parrott Lparrot@Freefromhunger.Org
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
Pact's Women's Empowerment Program (WEP) in Nepal operated through 6,500 groups with 130,00 women members. These groups mobilized nearly $2,000,000 of assets in less than three years with 94% on loan to 45,000 group members. By mid 2001, WEP had as many outstanding loans as CARD in the Philippines and Compartamos in Mexico, two very well known "credit-led" microfi-nance institutions, while working through three times as many groups. In addition, 65,000 group members learned to read through Pact's innovative curriculum that focused exclusively on managing a group, starting a business, and women's empowerment. WEP was implemented by 240 partners (most …
Ashrai: A Savings-Led Model For Fighting Poverty And Discrimination, Brett Matthews, Ahsan Ali Ashraibd@Bd.Drik.Net
Ashrai: A Savings-Led Model For Fighting Poverty And Discrimination, Brett Matthews, Ahsan Ali Ashraibd@Bd.Drik.Net
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
Ashrai is getting results with a savings-led model among minority peoples in northwest Bangladesh. These people are mostly landless and illiterate, and earn about $50 a year per person. They are a vital population segment that microfinance institutions in Bangladesh and elsewhere are unable to serve successfully. Ashrai began its field work ten years ago by replicating Grameen Bank, but rapidly learned from its clients that they needed savings at least at much as loans, flexible loan repayment schedules structured around seasonal cash flow, and an easing of the requirement that loans be for productive purposes. Ashrai takes an innovative …
End Matter, Journal Of Microfinance
End Matter, Journal Of Microfinance
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
No abstract provided.
Care's Mata Masu Dubara (Women On The Move) Program In Niger: Successful Financial Intermediation In The Rural Sahel, William J. Grant, Henry C. Allen Cd@Approtec.Or.Tz
Care's Mata Masu Dubara (Women On The Move) Program In Niger: Successful Financial Intermediation In The Rural Sahel, William J. Grant, Henry C. Allen Cd@Approtec.Or.Tz
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
CARE's Mata Masu Dubara (MMD) project is a women's time-bound accumulating savings and credit association (ASCA) program in rural Niger. Over the past decade, CARE has facilitated the creation of over 5,500 active women's groups with over 162,000, providing the purest forms of financial intermediation to their members in some of the poorest parts of Niger. Working from a very simple and appropriately adapted savings based product, sustainability and replication of the associations is easy to achieve. Due to the overwhelming demand for the product, CARE's role has evolved from service provider creating the associations to a facilitator that trains …
The New Microfinance: An Essay On The Self-Help Group Movement In India, Kim Wilson
The New Microfinance: An Essay On The Self-Help Group Movement In India, Kim Wilson
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
Indian NGOs have created at least one million self-help groups with 17,000,000 members since the self-help group concept was developed by MYRADA in the late 1980s. India is unique in that banks are permitted to lend directly to unregistered self-help groups and by May 2001, banks and cooperatives had financed 461,478 of these groups, with almost 200,000 new self-help groups financed between May 2000 and May 2001, indicating an accelerated process of expansion. The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) trains banks and refinances their loans. The key to NABARD's success is decentralization. Responsibility for group development and …
Book Review: Inner-City Entrepreneurship Development: The Microcredit Challenge By Nitin Bhatt, Jerry Black
Book Review: Inner-City Entrepreneurship Development: The Microcredit Challenge By Nitin Bhatt, Jerry Black
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
No abstract provided.
To Pay Or Not To Pay?: Local Institutional Differences And The Viability Of Rural Credit In Nicaragua, Johan Bastiaensen, Ben D'Exelle
To Pay Or Not To Pay?: Local Institutional Differences And The Viability Of Rural Credit In Nicaragua, Johan Bastiaensen, Ben D'Exelle
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
Innovative credit enterprises, aiming to expand the frontier of the rural credit market, can attain financial sustainabihty and broadened social outreach if they embed financial operations in local institutions, such as social networks and prevailing rules. Only in this way can the "rules of the game" imposed by the credit enterprise gain the local legitimacy that is necessary to reduce transaction costs sufficiently. The nature of preexisting local institutional environments, therefore, has a profound effect on the performance of credit enterprises. Our analysis of a rural microcredit program in two neighboring villages in Nicaragua indicates that existing patron-client structures, conditioned …
Community Savings Funds: Providing Access To Basic Financial Services In Marginalized Rural Areas Of Mexico, Gabriala Zapata
Community Savings Funds: Providing Access To Basic Financial Services In Marginalized Rural Areas Of Mexico, Gabriala Zapata
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
The Community Savings Funds (CSFs) promoted by the Ministry of Agriculture in Mexico seek to provide marginalized community groups with a simple mechanism that allows them to save and administer their own funds securely, efficiently, and profitably, according to their own needs and priorities. Specially trained promoters help set up CSFs for a period of one year—using a standardized Toolkit—after which they are expected to work autonomously. There are 540 CSFs in 12 states with over 12,800 members and savings totaling 4.45 million pesos (US 5445,000). This paper describes the characteristics of the CSF model and the results to date. …
Vol. 04 No. 2 Journal Of Microfinance, Journal Of Microfinance
Vol. 04 No. 2 Journal Of Microfinance, Journal Of Microfinance
Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review
No abstract provided.