The Microcredit Summit Campaign is a critical
current global strategy which seeks to
address the core goal of drastically
reducing the number of poor people in
the world.
“I am fully
convinced that the struggle against poverty
affects the entire world and not only
a few countries… Microcredit can
be one of the best tools in overcoming
poverty with dignity...”
- Vicente Fox, President of Mexico
“..Microcredit programs have
brought the vibrancy of the market economy
to the villages and to the poorest people
in the world. This business strategy for
combating poverty has allowed for millions
of individuals to work their way out of
poverty with dignity.”
- James D. Wolfensohn, President
of the World Bank
“Microcredit is a key tool in
combating poverty, and a wise investment
in human capital. Now that the nations
of the world have committed themselves
to halving the number of people living
on less than 1 USD per day, we ought to
contemplate even more seriously the essential
role which sustainable microfinance can
play and is playing in achieving this
U.N. Millenium Development Goal.”
- Kofi Annan, Secretary General
of the United Nations
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Background: What is the Microcredit
Summit Campaign?
The first Microcredit Summit was held February
2-4, 1997. More than 2,900 people from 137
countries gathered in Washington, D.C. to participate
at the Summit. It was the largest microfinance
gathering that had ever yet been organized
, and both leaders of the microfinance industry
and Heads of State participated. This Summit
launched a nine-year campaign with the defined
goal of “[w]orking to ensure that 100
million of the world’s poorest families,
especially the women of those families, are
receiving credit for self-employment and other
financial and business services by the year
2005.”
Three years later, at the United Nations Millenium
Summit in September 2000, more than 180 Heads
of State and of government agreed, for the first
time in history and at the highest political
levels, on the chief factors needed to accelerate
human progress. At the center of the Millenium
Development Goals (MDGs) is the reduction in
half of global poverty by the year 2015, reducing
the number of the poorest in the world from
1.2 billion to 600 million. The key development
challenge which the nations of the world face
is with regards to how to make this goal completely
operational; taking it beyond the usual lofty
rhetoric and entering into the reality of changing
people’s lives on a massive scale.
Before the launch of the Microcredit Summit
Campaign, a major development strategy focused
on the poorest people in the world did not exist,
and a strategy had not been conceived of how
to truly make an impact at a global level. The
truth is that it was common for the development
experts to set aside the poorest, saying that
they were too difficult to reach. For this reason,
many efforts were made to reach out to the “poor”,
but not to the poorest. Now many people concerned
with development recognize that we have a responsibility
to give the poorest an opportunity to rise out
of absolute poverty. This ought to be a critical
test not only of development, but of any global
desire to act morally.
The Microcredit Summit Campaign brings together
microcredit practitioners, advocates, educational
institutions, donor agencies, NGOs, and other
groups involved with microcredit, in order to
promote best practices in the field, to learn
from each other, and to work towards the goals
of the Summit.
What are the core themes of the Microcredit
Summit Campaign?
The core themes of the Microcredit Summit Campaign
are:
- Reaching the poorest
- Reaching and empowering women
- Building financially self-sufficient institutions
- Ensuring a positive, measurable impact on
the lives of the clients and their families
Objectives of the April 2005 Microcredit
Summit in Santiago
The Santiago Summit will provide an opportunity
to discuss and expand on the chief advantages
which microcredit offers as an instrument of
economic development in the Latin America/Caribbean
region. It will seek:
- To energize efforts in the region to achieve
the Microcredit Summit Campaign's goal
· To strengthen the concept of microcredit
as a tool for economic development that favors
the poor.
· To be a forum for the interchange of
experiences between institutions working with
microcredit in Latin America and the Caribbean.
· To motivate and highlight the efforts
of public servants, bank workers, microfinance
practitioners, and –in general- all those
whose work is related to microcredit.
· To sensitize authorities, entrepreneurs,
and society as a whole to give support to microcredit
initiatives.
Organizing Institutions in Chile
The Summit is co-organized by the Microcredit
Summit Campaign, based in Washington, D.C.,
and a Chilean Local Organizing Committee consisting
of:
· Desafío
· BancoEstado
· Caja de Compensación Los Andes
Other institutions that are collaborating in
the organization of the event are: the Ministry
of Economy, Mideplan and the Network of Microfinance
Institutions in Chile.
