KIVA - A Force for Good

I would like to introduce you to Kiva (http://www.kiva.com/), an organization that is helping to change the world by doing good.

First of all, a disclaimer : - I personally do not have any financial interest or business share in Kiva. I merely donate some money there to support the good work that they do.

What exactly does Kiva do?

Kiva allows you to provide interest-free loans to poor people around the world to set up small businesses so that they can provide for and support their family and/or community from the revenue that they generate.

It provides a platform for you to lend to a specific entrepreneur in the developing world and thereby empowering them to get out of poverty and be economically productive.

What you do is this - you look at the profiles of each of these entrepreneurs, who will state how much money they want to borrow and for what purpose. They will also indicate when they will repay the loan, the likely time-frame.

You decide how much you want to contribute - US$25, US$50 etc and this will be credited to the entrepreneur's account.

For example, an entrepreneur may ask for US$1,000 to launch a business to preserve the indigenous weaving traditions and provide jobs to the women in her community. You may want to loan her US$100 and this means that she will see 10% of her loan has been fulfilled. Other people will donate various amounts and when it reached 100%, you can no longer donate to this entrepreneur.

You just used your credit card or PayPal in the secured site to donate the amount that you want.

When the entrepreneur repays the loan in various amounts, the money will be automatically credited back into your account. And then, you can re-use this loan amount that is credited to your account to give another loan to another deserving entrepreneur.

Please go to Kiva's page for a detailed description of how they loan money to these entrepreneurs : - http://www.kiva.org/about/how

There is a real-time display of how much loan he had already repaid and how much the balance of the loan is.

So far, their success rate has been great as almost all of these entrepreneurs have returned the loans that they had taken out.

This is essentially micro-financing or micro-credit, like Muhammad Yunnus' Grameen Bank, who won the Noble Peace Prize in 2006 for his work to help eliminate poverty in the poorer countries.

So, do some good and be a force for positive changes in the world. These poor people in the developing countries are not looking for a hand-out - they are just looking for a hand-up, the opportunity to help themselves.

Rather than leaving your money in the bank earning a small interest, please do some good by donating whatever amount that you can. So, go to Kiva and donate generously!! http://www.kiva.com/

And the merits that you accumulated will be great indeed...