Nicholas D. Kristof, one of my favorite NYT writers, wrote an article yesterday called “You, Too, Can Be a Banker to the Poor“, where he describes his experience with kiva.org, a website that “lets you connect with and loan money to unique small businesses in the developing world“. Couple key points that are relevant to anyone using the internet to build applications that interface with people in the developing world:
Forging Real Connections Between Real People Makes People Safer
Direct financing by American to solid, market-economy type people with live in frenemy countries is a good idea. The children of loan partners are less likely to hate you, no?
Economic Relationships Provide Dignity For All Parties
Instead of handouts.
Lightweight Technology, Coupled with Offline Followup, Gets Things Done
Simple shopping cart, lots of due diligence (including a check of the Terrorist Exclusion List), no big time commitment.
Do Offline Things Offline and Online Things Online
When launching something like this, you’ve got to be like water— flow where you can, flow around where you can’t.
Mr. Abdul Satar said he didn’t know what the Internet was, and he had certainly never been online. But Kiva works with a local lender affiliated with Mercy Corps, and that group finds borrowers and vets them. The local group, Ariana Financial Services, has only Afghan employees and is run by Storai Sadat, a dynamic young woman who was in her second year of medical school when the Taliban came to power and ended education for women.
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Microfinance institutions typically focusing on lending to women, to give them more status and more opportunities. Ms. Sadat’s group does lend mostly to women, but it’s been difficult to connect some female borrowers with donors on Kiva — because many Afghans would be horrified at the thought of taking a woman’s photograph, let alone posting on the Internet.