Lime Peru, ACCION

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Mibanco

  • Active Clients: 362.282
  • Active Portfolio: $781,214,000
  • Average Loan Size: $2,015
  • Portfolio at Risk: 2.79%

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ACCION provides ongoing technical assistance to Mibanco developing new products and efficiencies

My role:

[list style="unordered"] [item]Analyze portfolio at risk and other key performance indicators. [item]Country analysis of political, economic, regulatory and financial situations. [item]Calculations of potential market demand for different regions. [item]Development of client protection policies. [/list]

[p]I learned:[/p] [list style="unordered"] [item]The poor are the most vulnerable in times of financial crises. [item]Client protection policies are needed to protect those living at the bottom of the pyramid. [/list]

ASA Dhaka Bangladesh

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Current issue surrounding micro finance in Bangladesh:

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  • As the market of micro-finance becomes more mature, competition becomes more intensified among major MFIs such as BRAC, Grameen Bank, ASA and others.
  • According to one ASA senior staff, about 500 MFIs are engaged in micro-finance in Bangladesh.
  • Against a backdrop of overheated competition, ‘’overlapping borrowing issues’’ among MFIs and borrowers has also become apparent.
  • As the number of heavily indebted borrower increases, the number of non-performing loans has been growing rapidly.

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Lessons Learned:

  • The percentage of overlapping borrowers were 20% in Rajshahi and 33% in Comilla, which indicates that ‘’overlapping borrowing issues’’ are quite serious in Bangladesh.
  • There was a trend that overlapping borrowers using more than three MFIs or entities were likely to fall behind their payment. (Or become overdue borrowers)
  • Also, there was a tendency that overlapping borrowers who did not invest their money into IGAs(Income Generating activities) were likely to fall behind their payment.

My suggestions to ASA

  • To improve the skill of credit analysis among loan officers.
  • To make its loan system more flexible to fully satisfy the demand of the clients.
  • To take an initiative to start a information sharing activities with other major MFIs such as BRAC and Grameen Bank.

[h3]Yasuhiko, [br] Blakeley Fellow 2010 [/h3]

MASAWA

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I've recently begun a social enterprise called Masawa with my co-founder, Julie Zollmann, that focuses on providing people in developing countries with greater access to information through mobile applications. Also involved in this start-up are Mariah Levin and Christine Martin, fellow 2009 Blakeley Fellows and Yanina Seltzer, a 2008 Fellow.

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We've received enthusiastic support from various large international aid organization, academics and technologists. We were highlighted as an outstanding commitment by the [url link="http://member.clintonglobalinitiative.org/Page.aspx?pid=3581" target="new"]Clinton Global Initiative[/url], and we also won the [url target="new" link="http://fletcher.tufts.edu/news/2010/04/features/masawa.shtml"]Tufts Business Plan Competition[/url]. We recently incorporated the organization, are waiting for our 501(c)3 status and are very fortunate to have Kim Wilson and Jenny Aker on our board.

The impetus for Masawa came from the experiences gained last fall and this January in Haiti, as well as from the project I worked on last summer in Niger as a Blakeley Fellow. This experience was tremendously helpful in realizing not only the great power of mobile applications in providing information to the poor, but also in how to operationally deliver these services.

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Fortunately, we've been very successful at finding potential partnership organizations, and we are currently aggressively fundraising for the proof-of-concept and pilot phases of the project

-Joshua Haynes, Blakeley Fellow 2009