Folks,
It is the time for giving with Christmas coming soon! Do you have people that you never know what to get them? Well try giving a gift donation of Kiva. Kiva connects people through lending to alleviate poverty.
Meg and I were given a $25 Kiva gift two Christmases ago in 2007. We soon gave a few more $25 loans to third world entrepreneurs to help them put together businesses to lift them out of poverty. I later sent out invitations to other like minded friends, I looked today and one of my invitations has given out 19 micro loans of which 8 have been pay back in full. Once you are paid back in full you can loan your money to another entrepreneurs.
Here is how it works. They post people or groups of people with donation goals and with $25 micro loans from many people at a time they get the funds they need then pay it back usually with in a year.
Here are some facts about Kiva.
Kiva is 50 months old
They have raised $105,968,360
98% repayment rate
260,967 entrepreneurs have been funded.
605,437 Kiva users
173 countries represented.
So if you would like to give a gift of Kiva here is the link
Here are links to some of the people we have given micro loans to
Kiganda D Group
Kawala 1c Group
Felicia Okunbor
4 comments:
What a great gift Randy! I have heard something about this but coming from you I feel more certain about what I might be doing. A wonderful way of helping others. Thanks so for this post. Carol
Thank you for sharing your experience. I've heard about this on NPR and it's just amazing how what is such a small amount of money to us can make a huge difference to others.
Carol and Ginger,
I really gets me how many people give to fund raisers over the telephone and in some case nearly nothing goes to the mission being fund raised for. With Kiva the money is loaned over and over if you like. Kiva does ask for 15% to cover expenses but you do not have to give 15% if you don't want to. I just loaned to 3 new groups last night, I was long over due to do this.
Thanks for posting this. Kim and I are planning on giving to Kiva this year. I think it's great.
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