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Table-banking, a booming loan facility among Kenyan women
Initially when she needed a loan, Joan Mwashi would approach a group she belonged to under a microfinance institution.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Unlocking the Unbanked: How cyber ID data can advance financial inclusion and ecommerce in emerging markets
Our financial systems rely on digital information footprints – credit data, banking histories, etc. – to determine whether a person is trustworthy. But many poor people live in a cash economy with no digital record of their financial history, preventing them from transacting with many companies. According to Stephen Ullford, cyber ID data offers one way to bridge this cash-digital divide and expand financial access to the unbanked.
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- Uncategorized
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MFI credit bureau on course in Ghana
Work on a credit referencing system for the microfinance sector is scheduled to be completed by middle of next year, the Ghana Association of Microfinance Companies (GAMC) has said.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- lending, microfinance
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Vittana to “cease to exist as a standalone organization”: The education-focused P2P microlender will wind down in its current form, its CEO says
“One of our founding beliefs was that once we reached scale, we could do our work sustainably, without shifting costs and risk onto the students,” wrote CEO Robin Wolander in announcing Vittana’s wind-down. “But after five years ... we haven’t found a robust business model to wean ourselves off that support.”
- Categories
- Education
- Tags
- lending, microfinance
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Y Combinator Nonprofit Zidisha Changes Microfinance Equation
The nonprofit says it has figured out a way of getting a 90% repayment rate on business loans to the types of people no financial institution would trust–young people in poor African countries without as much as a permanent address.
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- Uncategorized
- Tags
- lending, microfinance
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Reserve Bank of India Deputy Governor asks bankers to be innovative on home loans
Reserve Bank Deputy Governor R Gandhi today asked lenders to be more financially innovative in designing home loan products and suggested creation of a periodic deposit-linked facility.
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- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Achieving ‘Resilience’: Financial services beyond the scramble to survive
Since the Microcredit Summit Campaign began in 1997, the world of financial services for the poor has shifted from microcredit to microfinance—a broader range of formal and informal products and services. Resilience: The State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2014 reflects these changes with an interesting discussion of innovations that go beyond credit.
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- Education
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Chocolate at Risk?: Why sustainable finance is crucial to ensuring a steady cocoa supply for the world’s chocolate industry
Smallholder cocoa farmers in Côte d’Ivoire produce 40 percent of the world cocoa supply. Yet the vast majority still live in poverty due to declining productivity, and in the absence of long-term financing opportunities, many have been changing to other crops. Rainforest Alliance’s Helen Roy describes how socially-minded investors are mobilizing capital to help these farmers revive their land.
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- Agriculture, Environment