Tuesday, January 6, 2009

The Gift That Keeps on Giving

On the heels of a post about tight-fisted liberals this post is about helping the less fortunate, not through charity but through micro-lending.

A month or so ago I did a post about our charitable gift exchange for Christmas. I cheated a little bit and didn't actually give to a charity. Instead I came across an organization named Kiva that makes micro-loans to individuals in developing countries.

It's pretty simple, you look through the website and identify someone you want to lend to and then designate the amount of the loan...it can be as little as $25. Kiva keeps you up-to-date on the status of the loan in terms or disbursal, repayment, etc. When the loan is repaid you have access to the money again to lend to someone else.

My Secret Santa gift was for two loans, one to a woman in Vietnam to expand her rice business and another to a couple in Cambodia for the husband to grow his construction business.

It's a great idea on many levels...you can see the direct impact of your assistance and the money you lend will be available to support someone else once the loan is repaid.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Time Mag did a nice article on Kiva before Christmas which caused me to donate.

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