Some of you may recall that some time back I gave USD 200 as a gift, and gambled
around USD 800 in loans to http://www.kiva.org.
I eventually funded loans to:
Sofia Ticona in Bolivia
Ofeliz Lopez Gomez in Mexico
Loveth Eremwanarue in Nigeria
Hem Sean in Cambodia
Delphine KOKOUYE in Togo
I loaned only to women, no loans to men, cause they would probably just buy
beer, drugs and guns, right?
There were no defaults. Just as a test, I declined to re-loan, and instead transfered
all of the returned funds to my paypal account, using the returned funds to buy,
what else, but beer, drugs and guns
My conclusion after this test is that Kiva is indeed for real.
Caveats: Your loans are not tax-deductable.
There is a middleman who will charge the loanee some small interest.
You will only get back at most your principal, if the loanee repays 100%.
So, do something good. Help one of your brothers or sisters somewhere in the
world rise out of poverty.
Best,
Data
Kiva update
Moderator: Akira