>1. By its very definition, 'micro' credit means that the Grameen bank (and
>other similar institutions) have gendered the definition of how much money
>women are capable of handling. Generally very small businesses never grow
>into large businesses, so this is a way of isolating women into low capital,
>small return businesses.
>
>2. I fail to see the difference between many of the businesses started with
>micro loans and piece-rate-in-the-home or outwork as widely practiced in the
>nineteenth century, and practiced to a lesser degree in the twentieth century.
>Microcredit businesses tend to be: pot making, sewing garmets, making tourist
>sale items, hand crafted goods, etc. [...]
Get this piece of news from the World Bank. Development via street vending and car repair - with interest paid to the IFC.
>[World Bank News, July 30, 1998]
>
>Haiti to Open First Commercial Microcredit Bank IFC investing $500,000 in
>venture
>
>Haitian street vendors will soon get some overdue relief when the
>country's first commercial microlending institution opens its doors.
>
>Peter Tropper, an investment officer at the International Finance
>Corporation (IFC), announced on July 20 at a press conference in
>Port-au-Prince that IFC will invest up to $500,000 to create MicroCredit
>National (MCN), S.A. MCN will make very small loans to Haitian
>entrepreneurs to develop everything from market stalls to car repair shops
>and house-cleaning businesses. The investment marks IFC's first capital
>markets project in the country.
>
>Operating very small, informal businesses, whether selling cooking oil at
>the market place or operating taxis, is how many of Haiti's poor survive.
>These microentrepreneurs make up Haiti's unusually large informal sector,
>which comprises over half of the country's labor force.
>
> Currently, family connections and banks are the main conduit for people
>needing small start-up loans. But Banks willing to lend to low-income
>entrepreneurs usually charge astronomical interest rates of up to 100
>percent. MCN will give those entrepreneurs a market-oriented alternative.
>
>Karl Voltaire, Director of IFC's Latin America and the Caribbean
>Department, says that the project will make an important contribution to
>building Haiti's economy by providing microentrepreneurs credit on a
>self-sustainingbasis. Lending to women entrepreneurs, prime recipients of
>microcredit, will indirectly help improve the education, health, and
>nutrition of families.
>
>Haiti's second largest bank, Unibank S.A., is the project's leading
>sponsor with a 40 percent stake in MCN. IFC's equity investment will be up
>to 25 percent of the total project cost of $2 million. And IPC GmbH, a
>German firm, will take a 25 percent stake in the bank and manage the
>project for the first few years. Additional shareholders are expected to
>include International Cooperation and Development Fund of Taiwan, China,
>which also plans to extend a loan to MCN.
>
>In its first year of operation, MCN will offer microentrepreneurs loans of
>about $260, with terms of three
>
> months to one year. MCN interest rates will be above prime, reflecting
>the higher risks and administrative cost of microlending, but much lower
>than the rates charged by other financial institutions. By the end of its
>third year of operation, MCN expects to have a loan portfolio of $3.6
>million with 11,000 loans.
>
>MCN plans to open additional offices in Cap Haitien, Jacmel, and other
>cities, eventually expanding to rural areas. In five years, MCN
>anticipates employing 60 loan officers in six locations.
>
>For more information, callJannette Esguerra, 202-458-5204, far
>202-974-4384, or visit IFC at http://www.ifc.org/press.
>