Questions for Kiva (or you or me)

A couple of months ago, I talked with David about writing some articles for iPeace. I suggested a theme of peace vis-a-vis business. Since I've been deeply immersed in building a social investment platform, with an entrepreneurial tool set, for the past 2 years, which is designed to "improve socio-economic conditions world-wide" (read: set the conditions for world peace), my market research has led me to study many worthy companies, efforts and business models. I suggested to David that I'd love to go interview people at these admirable places. although I'm not a journalist or reporter, and am pretty immersed in my own work.

I made some initial forays with www.kiva.org, and www.betterplace.com, and got agreement for interviews. However, I'm so busy with Selfport, that I don't have the reporterly tenacity to keep hammering until these conversations materialize.

With Kiva, I first talked a bit with the president, Premal Shah. When I told him I was interested in hearing their views of how micro-finance relates to peace, he suggested I talk to Hind Tazi, who was leading Kiva's work in the middle east. Hind responded positively, but later re-routed me to their PR contact, Fiona. I talked to Fiona, and explained to her the kind of questions I'd like to cover, and even sent her a list of sample questions. But maybe she lost interest when she learned I wasn't a standard issue journalist, and was a mere, humble entrepreneur, trying to "save the world" in a way similar to, but different from Kiva (read: competitor).

Anyway, I told her I can answer my own questions, since I'm working in this space. And I think it would be great to hear answers to these questions for anyone on iPeace, or anyone who would like to consider the conjunction of economics, micro-finance, social conditions and world peace (or lack thereof.) So, I'm going to paste below here, first the comment I made to Fiona and the Kiva team, and then the questions I sent them, which have gone unanswered. Then I'm going to write my own blog entry, with my answers to these questions. Meanwhile, I welcome others to join in with their answers, observations, thoughts, and so on.

Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2009 10:05:00 -0800 From: Kelly Evans To: Premal Shah CC: Hind Tazi , Fiona Ramsey

Premal, Hind, Fiona,

Sure, I'd be happy to talk with Fiona.
I'll include here the kind of questions that I'd like to cover for an iPeace article about Kiva. I can answer these questions myself, since my life work the past couple of years has been designing a platform that can help p2p micro-finance and social entrepreneurialism to scale. So I have thought a lot about the implications of micro finance, natural next steps, the relation between micro finance and economic development and political stability, and so on. But for an article on Kiva, I'd certainly prefer to hear and quote your thoughts, and details about your work and foresight, than to just rely on my own analysis.

I'm not so interested to just write an article explaining what Kiva is, since that's been well covered already. I want to talk about where Kiva, micro finance and social business is going, and the potential for these areas to significantly improve conditions for all of us.

Best,
Kelly Evans

Questions for Kiva, and about Micro Finance in general

Please tell me your view of the relationship between economic development and political stability and peace. Can we imagine a comprehensive approach towards world peace, starting from here, and working through micro finance, social entrepreneurialism, and business in general…or is it more complicated than that?

If $34 billion in micro finance today is funding 100 million entrepreneurs a year, do you think that’s reaching everyone who fits today’s criteria of eligibility? If not, how many people could benefit from micro loans today?

What do you see as the relationship between Micro finance and economic development, world-wide, and or broken down by first and third world countries?

Can you tell me what you think about the types of businesses Micro loans usually fund, in relation to social business in general, either using Yunus’s definition, or in general?

Can you imagine a way to scale the micro finance world to accommodate larger businesses, while retaining the high pay-back rate?

Is there a way to make men better candidates for micro-finance?

Do you believe micro finance can scale, to accommodate people as the climb the social economic ladder, forming bigger businesses and making more money…particularly p2p micro-finance. This is sort of a loaded question, since the tools I’m developing are designed to allow for this.

What could, would or will Kiva do as it’s funding grows? If we pumped in an extra $million a year to Kiva, aside from the 8% tips it gets on loans, what would Kiva do?

I’ve noticed collective loans on Kiva, where a group has formed a business. Could this be a way that micro finance will scale to support larger businesses?

What’s the ratio of collective loans to individual loans? Is it changing?