Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Lending a Hand

Aloha to you all, my friend sent me an email the other day, with a very exciting project. There's a wonderful group of people that have come up with such a simple way to help the world's poorer communities. The concept is easy and very rewarding, you loan money to people, who want to set up their own business.

kiva.org enables you to connect with and loan money to small businesses in the developing world (microfinance). You can make as little as a US$25 loan to help low-income entrepreneurs in the developing world. ‘Sponsoring a business’ is an incredibly direct and effective way for us in the West to provide affordable working capital for the poor (money to buy a sewing machine, livestock, etc.), empowering them to earn their way out of poverty and into economic independence.

As my friend points out, " this concept strikes me as being a great way for me to keep recycling money as well as provide scope to give more than a standard donation – when you get your money back you can use it yourself, or re-loan it. The old saying, ‘give a man a fish and feed him for a day; teach a man how to fish and he can feed himself every day’ morphs to ‘help a man buy fishing equipment and he can feed himself and his family, sell fish as a livelihood, and then repay you so you can do it all over again!"

I don't need to say anymore then, one of the greatest things a human being can experience in their life time is the act of giving to another from the heart. I know I'll be sponsoring someone, anything that's this simple has to be a good thing. So please check it out, you'll find all the info you need, again their website is www.kiva.org , to give is to receive, its a natural law.