The 10th annual Skoll World Forum, which brought together several hundred of the world’s leading social entrepreneurs to Oxford, wrapped up last week.

As of today, the microfinance industry has new client protection standards and a Client Protection Certification Program aimed at retail financial institutions serving the world’s poor. The ambitious effort, created for and by the industry and managed by the Smart Campaign, represents an important milestone in the evolution of microfinance as a uniquely client-focused portion of the global financial sector. “There has been widespread demand for mechanisms that protect microfinance clients. This is the first program that verifies client protection publicly,” said Smart Campaign Managing Director Isabelle Barrès.

New tests are helping loan officers assess entrepreneurs -- and weed out the bad investment risks from the good

Dena Bank Chairperson and Managing Director Nupur Mitra, who is due to retire on December 31 this year, feels that customers at the bottom of the pyramid offer lot of opportunities for banks to expand business.

SUZHOU, China, Oct 31, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- In collaboration with the G20 Mexico Summit, Ashoka Changemakers(R) has named Micro Benefits one of five finalists in a worldwide social impact competition - the G2012 Mexico Financial Inclusion Challenge: Innovative Solutions for Unlocking Access. More than half the world's population - some 2.7 billion adults - lack access to basic financial services such as affordable credit, savings and insurance products.

One of the issues with the LendmeMula micro-credit service that we have covered here before, is that so far borrowers have had to wait for up to 24 hours before they could access the borrowed money in their bank accounts. The money had to be transferred by Lendme to their bank accounts. This made the process somewhat slow, and where a borrower did not have a bank ATM card, they had to pray they could access their money before the banks closed their doors.

Following its plan to switch millions of Nigerians from biomass to a clean and sustainable cooking gas, Oando Marketing Plc has entered into an agreement with Lift Above Poverty Organisation Microfinance Bank (LAPO) to provide soft loans for low-income households in Nigeria to purchase Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG).

In many parts of the world, if families outgrow their homes they simply add on to them. They grow 'em, piece by piece, room by room, brick by brick, when they get some extra cash. But, turns out, that's not very efficient. It wastes money, supplies, and lots of time. Alex Goldmark reports from Mexico, on a new way to build affordable housing -- and I mean really affordable.

It’s a period in history that India’s microfinance industry would probably rather forget: In late 2010, more than 200 poor residents of the Andhra Pradesh state committed suicide allegedly due to excessive pressure from microcreditors for debt repayments. Backlash against microfinance institutions not just in the state but the whole of India followed.

AHMEDABAD: International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, is helping Ahmedabad-based Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA) provide energy-efficient cook stoves and solar lanters to its members. IFC will provide a partial credit guarantee for a $5 million loan that an Indian private sector bank is providing to SEWA-sponsored Grassroots Trading Network for Women.

NEW DELHI – The Indian government Tuesday introduced a bill in Parliament that will give power to the country's central bank to regulate the microfinance sector, where companies lend to small borrowers. Introduced in the lower house of Parliament by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, the Microfinance Institutions (Development and Regulations) Bill will give powers to the Reserve Bank of India to set the maximum interest rate that can be charged by micro lenders. The RBI will also set performance standards for the institutions and ensure that they use "fair and reasonable methods" for the recovery of loans.

The government will form a commission to look into the activities of 54 organisations associated with Grameen Bank, the finance minister has said.

Online micro-lending platform Kiva has announced a partnership with Qatar's Silatech to develop an online funding programme for young Arab entrepreneurs.

Sometimes, small gestures can make huge differences in people's lives and livelihoods. That's the premise -- and the power -- of microlending.

First they were stripped of their utensils, furniture, mobile phones, televisions, ration cards and heirloom gold jewelry. Then, some of them drank pesticide. One woman threw herself in a pond. Another jumped into a well with her children.

Microfinance institutions in India have deviated from the idea of micro credit, Professor Muhammad Yunus, chairman of Yunus Centre and pioneer of micro-credit, has said. "They (MFIs) moved away from the idea of micro credit. That has created all the problems," said Yunus, in a media brefing in Mumbai. "MFIs based in Andhra Pradesh have drifted from their mission.

NetSuite , the SaaS business management solution vendor, is a publicly traded and profitable corporation. But NetSuite has a softer side, too - specifically, NetSuite.org, the company's corporate citizenship program that gives away NetSuite subscriptions for free to social enterprises. That is, enterprises, both non-profit and otherwise, who use market forces to achieve a soci...