The opportunity to rely on themselves, to think realistically of a day when poverty will be a thing of the past for themselves, their families, and possibly their communities, as well, is an enormous blessing for all concerned.
None of this happens easily, of course. Much hard work and dogged determination will be required to make these micro-businesses into growing, thriving, profitable success stories.
But most of these dreams do, in fact, come true.
As the business owners get to work, and start seeing their labors bear fruit, beliefs in scarcity and the inevitability of poverty start evaporating. These outcomes would be impossible without the initial loan of seed capital by small-scale venture capitalists like you and me.
That's where micro-lending site Kiva comes in.
Kiva brings together low-income would-be business owners in 70+ countries with small-scale funders to help make dreams real.
As a Kiva member, you deposit a fixed sum (say, $100) into your Kiva account, and then lend it out to one or more applicants applying for financial seed money to start their businesses. Would-be business owners post info about their themselves and their business aspirations to make it easy for funders to decided where to loan their money (country, type of business, picture of themselves, etc.).
Once the money you've loaned is repaid, it returns to your account, so you can lend it out again ... and again ... and again and again and again! Kiva boasts a 96% repayment rate (!), so your original investment of x dollars can easily have the impact of 5x or 10x or more!
Becoming an active Kiva lender is certainly one of the best ways to spend $100 and a half our every few months (and one of the most fun.)
Kiva is given the highest rating (for stars, 90%) by Charity Navigator:
Check out Kiva for yourself.
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Copyright © 2006-present: Christopher R. Borland. All rights reserved.
