Poor Entrepreneurs

Very small loans better known as microcredits caused sensations within the last years and onwards over the western and less developed countries.
The small loans are made to give poor people the chance to establish a sustainable means of income. These people don’t fulfil the minimal qualifications to gain access to traditional credits usually.

By the help of the microcredits, poor entrepreneurs gain the possibilities to
start self-employed projects to earn money
to find a way out of the poverty.

Trust building and help during difficult times are the main principles between the borrowers and the trust-driven banks across India, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Morocco, Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, Ethopia, Serbia, Russia, Pakistan, Mexico and Brazil.

In November 2008 the first micro-lending website kiva.org has launched its service on the Internet successfully. People donate money and lend it to the poor. The service provides useful information about the people’s backgrounds
and the planed projects of the unemployed.

Beside the sensation about small loans in the less developed countries
exists criticism. Gina Neff of the Left Business Observer claims that the success has been judged basically from a lender’s perspective. She mentions that the microlending Grameen Bank’s high repayment rate doesn’t reflect the number of women who are repeat borrowers that have became dependent on loans for household expenditures.

Also in the developed world like in the United States exists microcredits to help out people to find a way out of their poverty for example.

About 12.6 % of the United States population, 37 million people live below the poverty line. However microloans have less appeal on the people because they don’t


believe in escaping poverty by private enterprise.

Microloans U.S.

Kiva - microloans online

Journal of microfinance