Busy Busy Busy

Sorry about the light posting recently. I've been really busy not shooting people in the face.

Things with Kiva are going great. A few days ago Fiona and I sat down and had a talk with Matt Flannery (Kiva's Founder - read his blog here). Since our overall objective is to end global poverty (we aim high) the question has become a matter of how Fi and I can best affect the changes that need to happen in order to achieve that goal. Originally, we were planning on going to Africa in order to get poor Africans listed on Kiva's site, but we decided that right now the best way we can help Kiva is not by going to Africa but by staying out here a bit longer and working on server-side PHP implentation (for me) and going on a marketing blitz to sign up new Microfinancing organizations (for fiona).

So we've extended our stay in San Francisco for about a month. Luckily for us we've been blessed by a lot of people who have offered to put us up while we're working here. Right now we're staying in Palo Alto with Premal, a really great guy who's committed to pulling some major strings for Kiva. I'm not going to get into details, but if Premal can work some magic then it would truly be a hell of a thing.

Over the past week a lot has happened. I don't have a whole lot of time for proper writing, but here's a quick recap:

We signed up our first new partners on Kiva:

• The Shurush Initiative: Founded in 2003 and incorporated in 2004, The Shurush Initiative is a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity organization dedicated to improving the grave economic situation in the West Bank and Gaza through transparent microfinance and proactive employment.
• REDC Bulgaria: This organization currently focuses its efforts in and around Sliven, Bulgaria. However, through their parternship with the US Peace Corps, REDC will be able to lend efficiently to small businesses in 113 locales by leveraging the Peace Corps’ network of 178 volunteers.
• CRESP Senegal: In affiliation with CRESP in Ithaca, New York, the Senegal Ecovillage Network (GENSEN) facilitates this microcredit program for its network of 32 member villages. Committed to developing communities that are environmentally, economically and culturally sustainable, the ecovillages seek to combine the best of the past with appropriate modern technology.
• Prisma Microfinance: Prisma Microfinance, Inc. is a microfinance institution which provides micro-loans internationally, helping to alleviate poverty while providing a return to investors. Microfinance services are targeted to low and moderate income businesses and households including the provision of credit for micro-loans. (Prisma is HUGE, btw).

Instead of being focused in East Africa, now Kiva is funding entrepreneurs on three different continents. Not only is this just plain cool to say, it also means that Kiva is a lot more stable. For example, right now there's an energy crisis in Uganda which is where Kiva was conducting the vast majority of it's lending. This could have jeopardized Kiva's entire "portfolio", but now that our loans are spread out over the globe we're less likely to be affected by regional disasters.

Another amazing thing that happened is that two of Matt's childhood friends found out that they were awarded a $45,000 grant from Microsoft to help Kiva expand in the developing world! Obviously, this is incredible news, and it's opened my eyes up to some similar ideas for Fiona and I. It hadn't really occurred to me that it'd be possible to fund ourselves through grants and whatnot, but now I'm really starting to think about it. I mean, it's great to be here working with Kiva, but it'd be a whole lot better if we could turn this into a sustainable lifestyle. I've got so many ideas for where we could take Kiva that it'd be a shame to walk away from it in a few months without having explored all the options.

The last thing I'm going to mention (and trust me when I say I'm forgetting tons of stuff), is that a few days ago Fiona called the UN Microfinance Summit Campaign to ask them if they could send us their list of Microfinancing organizations and they were like "Oh, Kiva? Yeah, we think you guys are great. We've been sending everybody to your site."

The United Nations. I mean, holy shit.

Posted by flow Frazao on February 16, 2006 at 02:08 PM in Kiva/VEF, Microfinancing | Permalink