NextBillion - A WDI Publication

Bangladesh’s Largest NGO Admits Role in Microfinance Crisis

Bangladesh’s largest network of NGOs - BRAC has admitted fuelling the micro-finance debt crisis together with other microfinance institutions by pushing excess loans to the borrowers. Surplus funds in the absence of proper regulation led to the collapse of the microfinance industry. Dhaka: Lack of regulation and a surplus of donor funds in Bangladesh’s microcredit industry have led to NGOs pushing loans to over-indebted borrowers, says BRAC, the world’s largest develop...

Source

OneWorld South Asia (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

Bank of America Donates $1 Million for Social Entrepreneurship

The McDonough School of Business announced Tuesday that it will partner with Bank of America to form the Global Social Entrepreneurship Initiative, a program designed to prepare students to conduct successful socially-conscious business. The Bank of America Charitable Foundation has donated $1 million dollars to Georgetown to support the initiative. The gift is among the largest donations given to the university from the banking industry, according to an MSB press release. Accordi...

Source

The Hoya (link opens in a new window)

Rich Pickings

MENTION microfinance in Asia and thoughts usually turn to India, which is struggling to regulate the industry, and Bangladesh, where Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel prize-winning founder of Grameen Bank, has been turfed out of his job. Indonesia offers a brighter picture. There, a range of lenders is successfully funnelling credit to its entrepreneurial poor. They include Bank Rakyat Indonesia, a state-owned behemoth that had a whopping $7.4 billion in microloans outstanding in September and ...

Source

The Economist (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

In Developing Economies, Equity Beats Microfinance

A new effort is underway to advance entrepreneurship in the developing world. The U.S. State Department recently launched a program to promote business creation in emerging markets known as the Global Entrepreneurship Program . Leading entrepreneurs, investors, and corporations in the public and private sector met in Washington to discuss the best ways to achieve social and economic impact in u...

Source

CNNMoney.com (link opens in a new window)

Generating the Unlikeliest of Heroes

DOHA, QATAR - Persuading the Indian immigration authorities to grant entry visas to illiterate African grandmothers who claim to be trainee solar engineers is no easy task. Yet, Sanjit Bunker Roy, an Indian educator, has, since 2005, succeeded in bringing 140 such women to the Barefoot College, a school he founded...

Source

The New York Times (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

Investing in Agriculture Key to Ending Extreme Rural Poverty in South Asia ? UN

South Asia continues to have the largest concentrations of poor rural populations despite the fact that the wider Asia-Pacific region has made major strides in combating poverty, a United Nations agency said today, stressing that agriculture is key to poverty alleviation. The study by the UN International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), entitled Agriculture - Pathways to Prosperity in Asia and the Pacific , shows that rural poverty rates have dropped only slightly in t...

Source

UN News Centre (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

Foundation commits $2.2 mill for efforts at Hopkins-Nanjing

The Hassenfeld Family Foundation has committed $2.2 million to the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies to establish a social enterprise competition and fellowships at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies in China. The Hassenfeld Social Enterprise Fund will enable Chinese, American and other international graduate students to work together to develop real-world outcomes through innovative projects, while the Hassenfeld Fe...

Source

The JHU Gazette (link opens in a new window)

Region

Asia Pacific

Uganda: Understanding Consumer Protection in Microfinance

Lately, the Microfinance industry has come under the spot-light with critics arguing that microfinance institutions drifted away from their core and initial mission of working to uplift the poor out of poverty through micro loans. Critics argue that the entire microfinance business is now commercialized. This is what has probably resulted into draconian recovery methods; forexample in Mexico where loan officers take children after their parents are unable to make microfinance loans; to India ...

Source

allAfrica.com (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa