Grameen Global Network Update

Grameen Global Network (GGN) expects to organize meetings with its partners during the forthcoming Asia Pacific Region Micro-credit Summit (APRMS) Meeting of Councils which will take place in New Delhi, India from February 1-6, 2001. As of November 2000, GGN has 326 individuals and organizations as members.

More information on these meetings will be communicated to partners in the coming weeks. For more information on the APRMS, please contact :
APRMS Secretariat
All India Womens' Conference
6 Bhagwandas Road, New Delhi 11001, India Tel: 91-11-3389680, Fax: 91-11-338-4092,
E-mail: aiwcctc@nda.vsnl.net.in

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Grameen Bank & Nelson Mandela Share Gandhi Peace Prize

The former South African President Nelson Mandela and Grameen Bank will share this year's prestigious Gandhi Peace Prize.

The award, which carries ten million rupees as prize money and a citation, was announced at a press conference in New Delhi by the Union Minister for Culture, Mr. Ananth Kumar.

The prize, the highest international award instituted by the Government of India, is given for outstanding contribution to social, economic and political transformation through nonviolence and other Gandhian methods.

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Micro-Credit Role in Empowering Women Emphasized at Beijing Plus Five Conference

Five Years ago, at the UN Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, the Micro-credit Summit was announced during a panel discussion on micro-lending. The Summit's declaration included the goal of reaching 100 million of the world's poorest families, especially the women of those families with credit for self-employment and other financial and business services by 2005. The Grameen Global Network has committed to reaching ten million poor families (ten percent of the Summit's goal). The following is an update on the activities of the Micro-credit Summit.

The UN special session of the assembly entitled "Women 2000: Gender Equality, Peace and Development for the 21st Century conference (Beijing +5), on June 5,2000, offered an opportunity for key leaders in the micro-credit field to report on the progress made by the more than 3,200 institutions who are members of the Micro-credit Summit Campaign. The panel-which included first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, Dr. Muhammad Yunus, Micro-credit summit campaign Director Sam Daley-Harris and representatives from the United Nations. Development Fund for women (UNIFEM), the Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA) and the United Nations Development program (UNDP)-also reviewed the impact that micro-credit is having on the lives of the world's poorest women, the contribution of the Micro-credit Summit Campaign in moving closer to the goals of the Beijing Platform for Action.

Empowering women with Micro-credit, a report released by the Micro-credit Summit Campaign, surveyed 1,065 micro-credit institutions and found that as of December 31, 1999, these programs had reached 13.8 million of the world's poorest families. This represents an increase of 82 percent in the last two years. In other works, since the Summit was held, an additional six million of the world's poorest families have received micro-credit loans.

First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton remarked that "although it is called 'micro-credit', this is a macro idea with vast potential. Whether we are talking about a rural area in South Asia or an inner city in the United States, Micro-credit is an invaluable tool in alleviating poverty, promoting self-sufficiency and stimulating economic activity in some of the world's most destitute and disadvantaged communities".

In addition to serving on the panel and generating the report, the Microcredit Summit Campaign is also organizing regional micro-credit summit meeting for both Africa and Asia. The African Regional Summit was held in Zimbabwe on October 8-13, 2000. The Asia Regional Summit will be held on February 1-5, 2001, in India.

For more information, contact the Micro-credit Summit. Phone: 202-637-9600, Fax: 202-637,3566, E-mail: info@cicrocreditsummit.org. Web: wwwinfo@cicrocreditsummit.org

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ICICI In India starts wholesaling to leading MFIs

One of India's leading banks, ICICI Banking Corporation Ltd., is in the process of becoming a major lender to Indian MFIs. It has already sanctioned 20 million Rupees (US$ 444,000) to SHARE for on lending to the poor. It has also approved over US$ 1million to the Basic group, which is on - lending to both self-help groups and to microentrepreneurs. Both have got the Bank's prime lending rate of 12%. ICIC's Social Initiatives Group has also taken on the task of supporting capacity building among MFIs to improve their outreach, in addition to its existing social programs.

This new entrant into the financing of Indian MFIs comes in the wake of a circular from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) last February, requiring all banks to "make all out efforts at the provision of micro-credit". Some banks of course have been more receptive to RBI direction than others.

Oriental Bank of Commerce, which has been a pioneer in both direct lending to the poor through its Grameen Banking project and in wholesaling funds through MFI intermediaries, has considered performance standards over the more usual concern with equity, when considering applications from MFIs. "Recovery, expansion of client coverage and operation systems" is what the Bank will look at when it considers applications from MFIs, it stated in a recent letter.

Let us hope that other commercial banks in India will follow the example of ICICI and Oriental Bank and the RBI directive, so that the vast potential of the Indian banking system can be unleashed to provide the poor with credit.

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Microfinance Bank in Pakistan

Due to increasing demand for microfinancial services and operation of relativity few microfinance NGOs with limited capacity, the Government of Pakistan has planned recently to establish a Microfinance Bank (MFB) with assistance from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which would be registered under the bank company act. The MFB will try to involve the private sector in microfinance program, proper pricing of products for covering full cost and return on investment and strengthen local financial intermediations for more access to savings services and intermediate deposit for supplying productive loan to the poor. However, the new bank will take over the microfinance operations of the Rural Support Programs (RSPs) in the country and will leave RSPs to continue with their social programs only. Also the MFB will serve as an apex body of local banks and their surplus deposits should be deposited in MFB so that the amount could be made available to other deficit banks.

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36th International Dialogue Program

The Thirty Sixth International Dialogue Program organized jointly by Grameen Bank and Grameen Trust, was held on November 12-24, 2000. Twenty one participants from ten countries, i.e. Benin, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Honduras, India, Nepal, Nicaragua, Philippines, Pakistan, South Africa and USA, attended the latest dialogue program, which is intended for those who are interested in initiating a pilot or an action research project for launching micro-credit programs in their own countries to alleviate poverty.

Mr. Sean Connaughton from Kazama-Grameen, one of the successful project of Grameen Trust in the Philippines, was invited to attend the Dialogue as a resource person to share his experience regarding methodologies used in Grameen replication in his country.

Mr. J.Anthony Samy (WED, India), Mr. Jelshym Singh (WWAGS, India), Ms. Tsehay Tsegaye (SEPI, Ethiopia), Mr. Qamaruddin Khan (MCE, Pakistan), Ms. Samantha (CC Africa, South Africa), Mr. Bharat Joshi (Grameen Vikash, Nepal), Mr. Kipgen (TUDS, India), and Mr. Daniel Steinberger (Katalysis, Honduras) prsented their action plans, which they proposed to implement upon return to their respective countries. All the participants further registered their names as members of the Grameen Global Network (GGN).

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