KIVA Team Morgan Hill
Support Women in Developing Countries to Become Successful Entrepreneurs
KIVA Team Morgan Hill supports micro loans from the non-billionaire philanthropist. KIVA repayable Micro Loans directly address AAUW’s goal to empower all women and girls to reach their highest potential.
KIVA is a non-profit micro loan institution based in San Francisco. It began providing non-profit micro loans 10 years ago. Since its inception over $750 million dollars has been lent out to people who have no other way to get capital. Remarkably, the repayment of these loans is 98%, validating the effectiveness of the program.
Investigate how Micro Loans can:
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- Decrease poverty
- Increase opportunities for women all over the world
- Create independence
- Promote leadership
- Improve educational opportunities.
Kiva Success Story
Claudia is one of over a million success stories. She lives in Nicaragua and, until she discovered what a micro loan from KIVA could do, she and her family lived alongside their chickens in the stall in marketplace. She did not have the funds to send her children to school or buy more than a few chickens at a time.
After discovering KIVA, Claudia applied and received five successive loans over three years. With the capital she was able to buy chickens in bulk from a local farm. By buying in bulk she was able to lower her per-unit cost and increase sales volume, which translated into a higher profit margin and more revenue. Now all loans are paid back and her children are back in school. Her dreams for the future are to continually grow her business and help her kids succeed.
Claudia’s loan probably did not come from one person, but from many who may have loaned as little as $25.00 to get her started. KIVA provides the structure and opportunity for people who would like to help out but don’t have large amounts of extra money; getting involved takes as little as $25.00 and that has a 98% chance of being repaid. The lender looks for a borrower on the KIVA site, reads their story, and learns how much they are looking for and when they will get repaid. The entire transaction is completely transparent. KIVA coordinates borrowers and lenders, both in lending and repaying, to assure a smooth transaction.
How Can You Help?
The number of lenders to date is over 1.5 million people and growing, many working in teams, and they have empowered more than 1 million individuals and groups around the world to become economically independent and improve the stability of their community.
Although many South Bay residents have been involved with KIVA for some time, a local team has been formed to pull like-minded people together. ‘Team Morgan Hill’ identifies this community as one that is eager to get involved in helping to stabilize developing countries by financially empowering their citizens.
To get started now or for more information, go to KIVA.org and find “Team Morgan Hill” and/or contact Margaret McCann.