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Founded by microfinance pioneer Dr. John Hatch in 1985, The Foundation for International Community Assistance (FINCA) has been active in the global microfinance industry since its first microcredit program in El Salvador for low-income women in 1986. Operating in 21 countries with 2006 total assets of USD 252 million and a stated commitment to serving the poorest of the poor, FINCA relies on its grounding in Hatch’s Village Banking methodology, which dictates that local customers are the most knowledgeable regarding the management of their own assets. The model calls for cooperatives of 30 to 60 people to form around their mutual interest in pooling funds for inter-member loans and other financial services. Cooperatives gain access to additional capital by borrowing from financial institutions as a group, and then on-lending the funds to individuals, collateral-free.

In the third century B.C., a military leader known as Ashoka the Great traversed the Indian subcontinent with his armies, determined to unify the region. Subsequently horrified at the bloodshed that was involved, Ashoka renounced violence, embraced tolerance, and embarked on a campaign to spread development and social welfare throughout his empire. More than two millennia later, a U.S.-based non-profit organization emerged, bearing his name, to face the modern challenge of raising similar visionaries with sufficient means to achieve their visions.

Ashoka has since grown to become an association of 1,800 “social entrepreneurs” across 60 countries. Founded in 1980, it grants three-year stipends to individuals with ideas for innovative and sustainable ventures that have the potential to effect social change. These individuals become life-long Ashoka Fellows. Through the course of their projects, Fellows are periodically surveyed on the impact of their activities. They are also plugged into a global network of Fellows, collaborating with one other and contributing to an infrastructure of access to capital, academia, and business partnerships. In the end, Ashoka’s goal is the proliferation of a “citizen sector,” a segment of society that is distinct from the governmental and corporate sectors and is motivated to mount social challenges.

Unitus Inc., an American nonprofit committed to poverty relief through microfinance facilitation, has announced that the number of clients reached by its network of microfinance partners surpassed 3 million for the first time.

Dr. Akhtar Hameed Khan, a prominent figure who helped lay the basic foundations of the microcredit movement, is mostly known for his work on the Comilla Model of rural development in the 1960s and the Orangi Pilot Project in the 1980s. The Comilla Model was originally developed at the Bangladesh (formerly Pakistan) Academy of Rural Development, and focused on the integration of public and private resources in creating a central institutional base and developing around it various development programs. The Orangi Pilot Project was initiated as a grassroots development project that emphasized self-help as the primary means of developing the “katchi abadis” (informal sector).