Ryan Mark » asia http://ryan-mark.com Writer, coder, news hacker. Fri, 07 May 2010 16:46:47 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1 Little publicized problems with micro-credit http://ryan-mark.com/2008/04/27/little-publicized-problems-with-micro-credit/ http://ryan-mark.com/2008/04/27/little-publicized-problems-with-micro-credit/#comments Mon, 28 Apr 2008 01:51:59 +0000 Ryan http://digitaldivisions.org/?p=39 This is a bit off-topic for a blog about technology, but I posted yesterday about micro-credit financing helping people in Bangladesh setup phone business and want to follow-up with something I’ve found. Micro-credit has been touted as a great capitalist solution to poverty. A small loan and hard work should be enough to help people pull themselves out of poverty, right? Unfortunately not everyone is able to turn the loan into a successful business and there has been very information about the flip-side of this supposed wonderful idea.

France 24, a french television station did an investigative reporting piece on what happens when the poor take out the micro-credit loans and can’t pay them back. Loan officers of the Grameen Bank, the pioneer of micro-credit, are dispatched to do what they can to get the loans repaid. The poor residents of these villages are threatened with the loss of their homes and the few things of value that they own, and have no way to repay. Loan officers even persuade them to take more loans to try again to make money.

This all comes through the France 24 story, I’m sure there much more to the story, but this is quite troubling.

via Gawker

]]> http://ryan-mark.com/2008/04/27/little-publicized-problems-with-micro-credit/feed/ 0 The phone lady http://ryan-mark.com/2008/04/26/the-phone-lady/ http://ryan-mark.com/2008/04/26/the-phone-lady/#comments Sat, 26 Apr 2008 21:27:00 +0000 Ryan http://digitaldivisions.org/?p=38 Here is a good video about using microcredit to provide a poor remote village with a cell phone. The video is produced by the International Telecommunication Union, a special agency of the United Nations. Grameen Bank is an organization that provides micro-credit loans to people throughout the world, and provided the money the phone lady needed to get her business off the ground. The video looks at how useful and economically beneficial instant communication can be to individuals and communities.

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