Microcredit Summit Campaign
Encyclopedia
The Microcredit Summit Campaign is an American non-profit organization started as an effort to bring together microcredit
practitioners, advocates, educational institutions, donor agencies, international financial institutions, non-governmental organizations and others involved with microcredit around the goal of alleviating world poverty through microfinance.
The outcome of the first Summit was the launch of a "campaign" to reach 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 the year 2005. In January 2009, to coincide with the release of the State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2009 (SOCR), the Microcredit Summit Campaign announced that over 100 million of the world's poorest families had received a microloan.
The Campaign brings together microcredit practitioners, advocates, educational institutions, donor agencies, international financial institutions, non-governmental organizations and others involved with microcredit to promote best practices in the field, to stimulate the interchanging of knowledge, and to work towards reaching the following goals:
According to the State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2009, out of the total number of clients reached in 2007, 106 million were among the poorest and 83.4 percent (88.7 million) were women.
Of the 106 million poorest clients, 94 million of them (88.2 percent) are being served by the 76 largest individual institutions and networks reporting to the Campaign, all with 100,000 or more poorest clients.
The process of identifying access to microfinance
consists of (1) the circulation of Institutional Action Plans (IAPs) to thousands of practitioners with a request for submission of their most recent data; (2) a phone campaign to hundreds of the largest MFIs in the world to encourage submission; (3) a verification process seeking third-party corroboration of the data submitted by the largest MFIs; and (4) data compilation and analysis; and (5) the writing of the report.
Please Note: The data presented in the final report is mainly from individual institutions and excludes network institutions to prevent double counting.
Microcredit
Microcredit is the extension of very small loans to those in poverty designed to spur entrepreneurship. These individuals lack collateral, steady employment and a verifiable credit history and therefore cannot meet even the most minimal qualifications to gain access to traditional credit...
practitioners, advocates, educational institutions, donor agencies, international financial institutions, non-governmental organizations and others involved with microcredit around the goal of alleviating world poverty through microfinance.
History
The first Microcredit Summit was held February 2–4, 1997 in Washington, DC. The first summit had approximately 3,000 in attendance from 137 countries. Hillary Clinton gave the keynote speech at the first Summit.The outcome of the first Summit was the launch of a "campaign" to reach 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 the year 2005. In January 2009, to coincide with the release of the State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2009 (SOCR), the Microcredit Summit Campaign announced that over 100 million of the world's poorest families had received a microloan.
| List of Microcredit Summit Campaign Conferences |
|---|
| 1997, Microcredit Summit, Washington, DC, February 2–4. |
| 1998, Global Microcredit Summit, New York City, June 24–27. |
| 1999, Global Microcredit Summit, Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire, June 24–27. |
| 2000, Middle East/Africa Region Microcredit Summit, Harare, Zimbabwe, October 8–13. |
| 2001, Asia/Pacific Region Microcredit Summit, New Delhi, India, February 2–5. |
| 2001, 1st Latin America/Caribbean Region Microcredit Summit, Puebla, Mexico, October 9–12. |
| 2002, Global Microcredit Summit +5, New York City, November 12–13. |
| 2004, Asia/Pacific Region Microcredit Summit, Dhaka, Bangladesh, February 16–19. |
| 2004, Middle East/Africa Region Microcredit Summit, Amman, Jordan, October 10–13. |
| 2005 Latin America/Caribbean Region Microcredit Summit, Santiago, Chile, April 19–22. |
| 2006, Global Microcredit Summit, Halifax, Canada, November 12–15. |
| 2008, Asia/Pacific Region Microcredit Summit, Bali, Indonesia, July 28–30. |
| 2009, Latin America/Caribbean Region Microcredit Summit, Cartagena, Colombia, June 8–10. |
| 2011, Global Microcredit Summit, Valladolid, Spain, November 14–17. |
Approach
The Campaign was founded on a principle that emphasized a citizen-led approach of establishing and meeting a collective global goal. The Campaign represents more than a single organization and is a social movement that aims to advance the microfinance field and foster a productive learning community.The Campaign brings together microcredit practitioners, advocates, educational institutions, donor agencies, international financial institutions, non-governmental organizations and others involved with microcredit to promote best practices in the field, to stimulate the interchanging of knowledge, and to work towards reaching the following goals:
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Microfinance access
By December 31, 2007, the Campaign counted 3,552 microfinance institutions that reported reaching more than 154 million clients with a current loan. Of these institutions in the developing world, 935 are in Sub-Saharan African, 1,727 are in Asia and the Pacific, 613 are in Latin America and the Caribbean with the remainder (85) in the Middle East and North Africa.According to the State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2009, out of the total number of clients reached in 2007, 106 million were among the poorest and 83.4 percent (88.7 million) were women.
The growth in the number of very poor women reached has gone from 10.3 million at the end of 1999 to 88.7 million at the end of 2007. This is a 764 percent increase in the number of poorest women reached from December 31, 1999 to December 31, 2007. The increase represents an additional 78 million poorest women receiving microloans in the last eight years.
Of the 106 million poorest clients, 94 million of them (88.2 percent) are being served by the 76 largest individual institutions and networks reporting to the Campaign, all with 100,000 or more poorest clients.
| Size of Institution (in terms of poorest clients) | Number of Institutions | Number of Poorest Clients | Percentage of Total Poorest |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 million or more | 10 | 28,098,014 | 26.36 |
| 100,000-999,999 | 60 | 17,184,064 | 16.12 |
| 10,000-99,999 | 310 | 8,525,154 | 8.00 |
| 2,500-9,999 | 533 | 2,608,463 | 2.45 |
| Fewer than 2,500 | 2,633 | 1,454,464 | 1.36 |
| Networks | 6 | 48,714,520 | 45.70 |
Broader impacts
- MicrofinanceMicrofinanceMicrofinance is the provision of financial services to low-income clients or solidarity lending groups including consumers and the self-employed, who traditionally lack access to banking and related services....
means offering basic financial services such as loans, savings, money transfer services and microinsuranceMicroinsuranceMicroinsurance is a term increasingly used to refer to insurance characterized by low premium and low caps or low coverage limits, sold as part of atypical risk-pooling and marketing arrangements, and designed to service low-income people and businesses not served by typical social or commercial...
to poor people. Access to microfinance helps people living in poverty to start or grow their businesses, build assets, and smooth consumption.
- Health educationHealth educationHealth education is the profession of educating people about health. Areas within this profession encompass environmental health, physical health, social health, emotional health, intellectual health, and spiritual health...
is the provision of learning opportunities on basic health issues and other health related topics. Attempts to integrate microfinance with health have shown that families accessing microfinance have better health practices and better nutrition and are less sick than comparison families.
- Poverty measurement is the process of collecting and analyzing information on the well-being of the poor (poverty, inequality, and vulnerability) for the purpose of understanding their situation. Similarly, the Movement above the US$1 a Day Threshold Project (MDP) seeks to bring poverty measurement to scale within the field of microfinance.
State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report
The State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report is an annual report that compiles outreach data from microfinance institutions (MFIs) around the world. It is a platform to promote the campaign’s goals as well as an opportunity to extend updated information in the field of microfinance to the general public and practicing institutions.Survey methodology
The Microcredit Summit Campaign has collected data for the State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report for 11 years and has verified that data for the last nine years.The process of identifying access to microfinance
Microfinance
Microfinance is the provision of financial services to low-income clients or solidarity lending groups including consumers and the self-employed, who traditionally lack access to banking and related services....
consists of (1) the circulation of Institutional Action Plans (IAPs) to thousands of practitioners with a request for submission of their most recent data; (2) a phone campaign to hundreds of the largest MFIs in the world to encourage submission; (3) a verification process seeking third-party corroboration of the data submitted by the largest MFIs; and (4) data compilation and analysis; and (5) the writing of the report.
Please Note: The data presented in the final report is mainly from individual institutions and excludes network institutions to prevent double counting.