Ranked #1 in the World
Check out the eye-opening interview of Banco Compartamos founder Carlos Danel during his visit last week to Thunderbird. It is quite telling that his publicly traded micro-finance bank does not even use the term “poor”. If you want to help a low-income individual help themselves, they argue, begin by treating them and serving them as clients. This basic philosophy, which is at the heart of so-called “base of the pyramid” strategies, has caused quite an upheaval in sectors of the microfinance community. But meanwhile Compartamos continues to create value for clients who would otherwise continue to be left out, and do so in a financially sustainable and scalable way.
Thanks for paying us a visit Carlos. And keep the good work!
February 17th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
¨Romanticizing the poor can be very harmful. Market solutions to poverty portray poor people as creative entrepreneurs and discerning consumers. However, this view is not only wrong, but also harmful as it makes corporations, governments and nonprofits not give all the protection this vulnerable population needs. Romanticizing the poor also hinders realistic interventions for alleviating poverty.¨
Stanford Social Innovation Review
“One audit of 400 Microcredit-enabled businesses in Central America found only 1 enterprise with even a single employee outside of the owner’s immediate family.”
Is this a success story? for every 399 of failure?
We´re talking development, that is creating jobs, which is a consequence of growth, which in turn comes from a better supply and we all know that a small percentage of humans have the personality characteristics to be
successful entrepreneurs.
Many borrowers get caught in debt traps, taking
out loans from micro lender 1 to pay off micro lender 2.
Microfinance Misses Its Mark
http://www.ssireview.org/articles/entry/microfinance_misses_its_mark/
A Second Look at Microfinance: The Sequence of Growth and Credit in Economic History
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=7517
Thank you
Daniel Martin Mora