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Update from the Field: Personal Connections, Supply and Demand + A Culinary Excursion
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 23 May 2011
Compiled by Kathrin Gerner, KF15, Togo As the 14th class passes the baton to the 15th class, the Kiva fellows are sharing their final thoughts and first impressions. Be inspired by the personal connections Kiva creates between lenders and borrowers in Nepal and Sierra Leone. Find out how a phenomenal harvest can prevent farmers in Nicaragua from repaying their loans. Discover the creative ways of assessing credit worthiness used in Uganda and around the globe. Sample local customs and cuisine, while reading about the Day of the Child in Mexico and taking a culinary excursion in Liberia.
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Update from the Field: Farewells, Mistaken Identities + Micro-Microfinance
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 2 May 2011
Compiled by Alexis Ditkowsky, KF14, South Africa We've officially hit the point in the Kiva Fellows cycle where the current batch says goodbye just as the latest group is getting their bearings at Kiva HQ. Fortunately, there are a number of posts this week to help us through the transition and cheer us up. If you're interested in a comprehensive image gallery of the hot designs for share taxis in Rwanda, we've got you covered.
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Update from the Field: Fun Facts, Field Visits + Back to Basics
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 21 March 2011
Compiled by Alexis Ditkowsky, KF14, South Africa For many Fellows, this week was about getting back to basics: the borrowers. In between fun facts about Kiva Fellowships, doing database detective work, and reflecting on the internal dynamics of Kiva's partner microfinance institutions, Fellows found themselves in the field again and again, much to their delight and often to the delight of borrowers.
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Update from the Field: Man’s Day, Singing Fellows + Learning How to Count
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 7 March 2011
Compiled by Alexis Ditkowsky, KF14, South Africa The Fellows will be covering International Women's Day later this week but let's take a moment to acknowledge its lesser-known cousin in Kyrgyzstan, "Man's Day".
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$3,000 Rent Anyone? Renta de 3,000 dólares? No, Gracias!
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 29 January 2011
by Carlos Cruz Montaño, KF14, Liberia Upon arriving to Liberia I started looking for a place to live, was just looking for a furnished apartment with nothing out of the ordinary... walked into a new building that was almost finished. The apartments included things like power 24/7, water, water heaters, bedroom set, TV, and a kitchen with gas stove, fridge and some cabinets... nothing out of the ordinary, right? Then I asked about the rent... how much? Three thousand dollars??? Despues de llegar a Liberia me dediqué a buscar un departamento, algo simple y sin lujos.
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This, too, is Liberia
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 29 October 2010
by EB Moore, KF12 Liberia As I prepare to leave Liberia, I find that I'm at a loss for words to describe my feelings. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'm letting some photos do the talking for me in this photo diary.
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Bridging the Divide
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 11 October 2010
By EB Moore, KF12 Liberia As the concept of microfinance has become more widely known, it has grown to occupy a strange space between business and philanthropy. Where is it currently, and where should it be?
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A Taste of Liberia
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 31 August 2010
By EB Moore, KF12 Liberia To help wrap up food month at Kiva, I wanted to share some of what I've learned about Liberian food. Here is a short discussion of Liberian food, a recipe for Potato Greens, and links for those who want to learn more.
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Google Comes to Liberia
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 23 August 2010
By EB Moore, KF12 Liberia Several days ago I attended an event at Monrovia’s City Hall called “Internet Camp Liberia,” hosted by representatives from Google. I found it very informative and well-targeted, in addition to having some larger implications for microfinance in the region.
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5 Things To Know About Liberia
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 11 August 2010
As my time in Liberia comes to a close, I am reflecting back on all that I’ve learned over the last three months. I’d like to pass along some helpful information to any readers who may be planning to travel to Liberia in the future. Liberian English Is Way More “Liberian” Than It Is “English” [...]
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Traveling to Liberia? Be Prepared.
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 11 August 2010
As my time in Liberia comes to a close, I am reflecting back on all that I’ve learned over the last three months. I’d like to pass along some helpful information to any readers who may be planning to travel to Liberia in the future.
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Debt Collecting Can Be Fun!
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 10 August 2010
By EB Moore, KF12 Liberia As Kiva lenders, you have experienced the exciting feeling of seeing your loaned funds return to your account, ready to be re-lent – but what happens when your funds aren’t returned when you were expecting them (or at all)? As a Kiva fellow working with LEAP (Local Enterprise Assistance Program) in Liberia, I was able to get first hand experience with how delinquent loans are dealt with.
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Think, Pray, Work
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 2 August 2010
In 1997 Esther Borh was a LEAP Borrower. Today she is the branch manager of one of LEAP's 12 branches. In describing her job, Esther says that, "I think, pray, and work for everyone."
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USA vs. An Entire Continent
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 30 June 2010
With this win, Ghana would become only the third African team to ever make it to the quarterfinals of The World Cup. No, Ghana, and Africa as a whole, had much more riding on this game.
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Why Do We Lend?
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 9 June 2010
After immersing myself in all things Kiva, I was prepared to answer a lot of questions, but none as basic as this one.
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How Do You Define “Efficient”?
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 17 May 2010
Even in my wildest “imagine what it would be like” scenarios, never in a million years did I stop to ask myself, “How did people conduct modern day business before paved roads, a reliable postal service, unlimited phone plans, reliable electricity, etc.?” Well here in Liberia, the questions are not hypothetical.
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Don’t Eat the Money
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 12 May 2010
By Karen Buxton, KF10, Liberia Liberians have many expressions that make me smile. Rather than saying, “How are you?” they ask “How da body?” and respond “Body fine-o!” Rather than “Don’t use your loan for personal expenses – use it for your business,” they encapsulate the notion into: “Don’t eat the money!” Don’t eat the money is an important concept that is essential for microfinance to work effectively.
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A Country in Transition
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 7 May 2010
By Karen Buxton, KF10, Liberia One of the reasons I was initially inspired to do a Kiva Fellowship in Liberia is the fact that Ellen Sirleaf was elected President of Liberia four years ago, making her the first democratically elected woman president of any country in Africa. Having been here for three months, I can personally attest to the fact that Liberia is filled with strong, determined, tenacious, resilient women.
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Liberia: Tryin’ Small
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 4 May 2010
Liberia is tryin’ small. This common expression can be heard everywhere here: it means “I’m okay” or “I’m getting by” and is the equivalent of how many Americans reflexively answer “Fine” to the greeting “How are you?” But many in Liberia are tryin’ larger, thanks to microfinance institutions, many of which have set up shop since 14 years of civil conflict ended in 2003.
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A Balancing Act
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 15 April 2010
By Karen Buxton, KF10, Liberia For Kiva’s field partners to transition from being a ‘Pilot’ partner to an ‘Active’ partner, they must successfully pass a process Kiva calls Borrower Verification. Borrower Verification entails interviewing a random sample of 10 Kiva borrowers from the same field partner to ensure the information on the ground matches the information on Kiva’s website.
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An emerging frontier on the last-chance continent
Blog: PocketCultures - 8 April 2010
Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has what might be one of the most impressive CVs of any head of state in the world. Africa’s first elected woman president spoke at IESE Business School in Barcelona two weeks ago, in a session titled Africa: The last chance?
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Liberians changing their world, one story at a time
Blog: PocketCultures - 5 April 2010
When journalist Ruthie Ackerman founded Ceasefire Liberia blog in May 2009 she found that Liberia’s young people were very excited about the opportunity to tell their stories to the world.
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D-Day in Liberia
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 22 March 2010
In Liberia, D-Day is a regular occurrence. Disbursal Day, that is. Microfinance is a key part of the post-conflict recovery, and LEAP, Kiva's Liberian field partner, is at the forefront. LEAP (the Local Enterprise Assistance Program) is Liberia's oldest continuously operating microfinance lender, and the largest by number of borrowers and amount lent.
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Are you MaD: Peace Building, Post-Conflict
Blog: This is Ghana: All the stuff the guide books leave out...and more. - 13 March 2010
This is the third post in our series about Making a Difference at G-lish. You can learn about three organisations doing their very significant part to improve condition after a war has ended, to help ease conditions during war time, or to try and prevent conflict from occurring in the first place. The three organisations reviewed are Akawelle Jewellery, a Liberian jewelry designer (and so much more) using bullet casings to design pendants, Pennies for Peace, the organisation of Greg Mortensen (Three Cups of Tea), and Peace One Day, founded by the amazing Jeremy Gilley.
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From Borrower to Branch Manager
Blog: Kiva Stories from the Field - 10 March 2010
Cecilia Wilson was born in Grand Kru County, Liberia, in 1964. She graduated from Tubman High School in Monrovia when she was 18, and by the time she was 30 years old, she had two children and she found herself selling rice and oil on the sidewalk at a market just outside of Monrovia. With the goal of improving her business by moving it off of the sidewalk, Cecilia took out her first microloan of $50 USD from a newly established microfinance institution (MFI) in Monrovia called Local Enterprise Assistance Program (LEAP). She used the loan to purchase additional rice and oil to sell.
