Live Blogging the Microfinance India Summit: Beyond Pomp and Circumstance

I am going to be going for speed today, at the likely cost of some quality.

At the moment, we are listening to the Welcome Address to the Microfinance India Summit being delivered by Brij Mohan, the Chairman of ACCESS. My eyes are drawn to the huge board that serves at the backdrop to the dais. On the board are 4 photos which have one thing in common. The photos are all of smiling women. Not a man to be seen. Although, I have never considered microfinance primarily a women’s empowerment movement, there are many practitioners and funders who do. This almost exclusive focus on women could be limiting the impact of microfinance if the findings from this study, conducted by De Mel, Mckenzie and Woodruff, on returns to investment in Sri Lanka, are generalizable. The study finds that monthly returns to enterprises run by men averages around 9% while for women the number is close to 0. It may be true that women repay more consistently, but repayment rates do not equal impact.

So in conclusion, I think 1 of the 4 photos should include a male.

The speech of Dr. Suresh Agarwal, Chairman of the Prime Ministers Office and Chief Guest of the conference, reminded me of the beauty and uniqueness of microfinance being demand driven (the reason I became interested in the sector in the first place. He instructs the MF sector to remain focused on the welfare of clients and the long term health of the industry, and not to resort to foisting debt on poor people without credit capacity simply because the government has set a certain target for lending.

* Thanks to Justin Oliver for pointing me to the Sri Lanka study.