Fifteen investment funds, representing approximately USD 550 million in capital, have committed to utilize GIIRS (Global Impact Investment Ratings System) ratings, a system for assessing the social and environmental impact of investment funds. The investment funds will become members of the GIIRS Pioneer Funds, which have agreed to be among the first forty funds to receive a GIIRS Impact Rating.
Search Results for: measure
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Standard Bank: Majority of Africans Lack Access to Microfinance, Other Financial Services
A new report from Standard Bank of South Africa reveals that many financial services remain unavailable to the majority of the people that live in Africa.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Microfinance Investor BlueOrchard Releases 2011 Social Performance Data
BlueOrchard, a commercial microfinance investment company based in Switzerland, has released its annual social performance report for 2011, which presents the social impact of its investments in approximately 75 microfinance institutions (MFIs).
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Center for Financial and Credit Counseling of Bosnia Offers Debt Mediation, Financial Education to Microfinance Clients
The Center for Financial and Credit Counseling (CFKS), a nonprofit established in 2010 in the Bosnian city of Tuzla, has been set up to counter the negative impact of over-indebtedness through financial education, counseling, mediation and debt resolution.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: FINCA Case Studies Explore Relationship Between Food Security and Microfinance, Analyze Client Data Using World Bank’s Human Opportunity Index
FINCA International, a US-based network of microfinance institutions (MFIs) in 21 countries, recently published two case studies: “Exploring the Linkages between Food Security and Microfinance: A Study by FINCA in Zambia and Guatemala” and “FINCA Client Data Viewed through World Bank’s Human Opportunity Index.”
MICROFINANCE PAPER WRAP-UP: Selective Knowledge: Reporting Biases in Microfinance Data, by Jonathan Bauchet and Jonathan Morduch, Published by Financial Access Initiative (FAI) at New York University’s Robert F Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and Hunter College
By Jonathan Bauchet and Jonathan Morduch, published by the Financial Access Initiative (FAI) at New York University’s Robert F Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and Hunter College, June 2009, 39 pages, available at:
http://www.nyu.edu/projects/morduch/documents/articles/2008-06-Selective-knowledge.pdf
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Microfinance Portfolio Risk Jumps in Tunisia, Egypt, As a Result of Political Unrest
Sanabel, a network of microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Arab countries, has reportedly released results of a survey of MFIs in Tunisia and Egypt that indicates a significant increase in portfolio-at-risk (PAR) since political instability and social unrest recently broke out in those countries.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Central Bank of Kenya Requires Mobile Phone Carriers to Adopt Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard
The Kenyan Ministry of Information (MOI), through the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK), is newly requiring mobile phone firms to adopt new measures to protect their systems from improper access and to file related security audit reports on an annual basis.
MICROFINANCE PAPER WRAP-UP: Financial Access: State of the Art in Nepal, by Nara Hari Dhakal, Published on the Microfinance Gateway
By Nara Hari Dhakal, published on the Microfinance Gateway; 2011; 8 pages; available at
http://www.microfinancegateway.org/p/site/m/template.rc/1.9.52121?cid=PS…
MICROFINANCE PAPER WRAP-UP: Foreign Capital Investment in Microfinance: Reassessing Financial and Social Returns; By Xavier Reille, Sarah Forster and Daniel Rozas; Published by CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor)
By Xavier Reille, Sarah Forster and Daniel Rozas; published by CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor); 2011; 16 pages; available at http://www.cgap.org/gm/document-1.9.50967/FN71.pdf
MICROFINANCE PAPER WRAP-UP: Micro-loans, Insecticide-Treated Bednets and Malaria: Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial in Orissa (India); By Alessandro Tarozzi, Aprajit Mahajan, Brian Blackburn, Dan Kopf, Lakshmi Krishnan, Joanne Young; Working Paper Published by The Centre for Micro Finance, IFMR Research
By Alessandro Tarozzi, Aprajit Mahajan, Brian Blackburn, Dan Kopf, Lakshmi Krishnan, Joanne Young; published by the Center for Microfinance (CMF) at IFMR (Institute for Financial Management and Research); March 2011; 58 pages; available at http://ifmr.ac.in/cmf/publications/wp/2011/Bednets.pdf
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Jonathan Lewis of Opportunity Collaboration Responds to Complaints that “Microcredit Does Not Solve Poverty”
The Huffington Post, a US-based news website, recently published an editorial series by Jonathan Lewis, founder of the annual Opportunity Collaboration retreat for social investors, titled “Social Impact Evaluation: Useful? Utopian?”, which responds to suggestions by members of academia and the media that “microcredit does not solve poverty.”
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Imp-Act, MicroSave Launch Guidance Notes on Social Performance Management for Microfinance Institutions (MFIs)
Imp-Act, a UK-based consortium of nine organizations focused on the social performance management (SPM) of microfinance institutions (MFIs), and MicroSave, a for-profit technical assistance, training and resource center in India, recently introduced two new “guidance notes” in English, French and Spanish, titled “Strategic Planning: Integrating SPM into Microfinance Capacity Building” and “Governance: Integrating SPM into Microfinance Capacity Building”. According to the Social Performance Task Force (SPTF), an initiative of CGAP
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Articles Published by The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal Question Impact of Microfinance, Role of Commercialization
In recent articles published on the websites of newspapers The Guardian of the UK and The Wall Street Journal of the US, journalists, academics and practitioners express concerns about various topics in the microfinance sector including social performance measurement, commercialization and changing methodologies.
MICROFINANCE EVENT: Hanson Wade Hosts “Impact Investing Summit: Advanced Investment Strategies for the Bottom of the Pyramid” in Washington DC, USA, September 20 – September 21, 2011
Event Name: Impact Investing Summit: Advanced Investment Strategies for the Bottom of the Pyramid
Event Date: September 20 to September 21, 2011
Event Location: Holiday Inn Central / White House, Washington DC, USA
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Panel Discusses Balancing Profit, Mission, Impact at Microfinance USA Conference 2011, Presented by Opportunity Fund, ACCION, Kiva, in New York City, May 23 – 24
Opportunity Fund, a nonprofit organization based in the US state of California that offers microloans and microsavings primarily to people in the San Francisco Bay area; ACCION International, a microfinance organization that provides lending and financial education to small businesses in twenty-three countries; and Kiva, a US-based online portal that allows individuals to make loans to microfinance institutions (MFIs) for on-lending to poor people in sixty countries, hosted the Microfinance USA Conference 2011 on May 23 and May 24 in New York City.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: MFTransparency Launches Microfinance Transparent Pricing Initiative in Guinea Bissau, Tanzania
MFTransparency, a US-based nongovernmental organization that provides information on credit products and pricing, recently announced plans to expand its Transparent Pricing Initiative to Guinea Bissau and Tanzania with the objective of collecting and publishing pricing data for microfinance products offered in each country and providing training on financial literacy for microfinance clients.
MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) Makes $3m Debt Investment in Fondo de Capital Privado Inversor of Colombia to Support Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs) That Serve Poor People
The Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF), an investment fund administered by the US-based Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), recently loaned USD 3 million to the Fondo de Capital Privado Inversor (FCPI), a Colombia-based venture capital fund.