Posted by Glenn Fadner on 4/6/2011

Rebecca and I recently finished reading a fascinating book. "A Fistful of Rice", published earlier this year details Vikram Akula's vision of creating a micro-finance enterprise on a scale never before dreamed of. While working with a micro-finance enterprise in India, Vikram came face-to-face with several realities

Very small loans could lift people out of poverty and despair
Most of the poor know how to work themselves out of poverty, but lack the access to capital to do so
The need for micro-loans cannot be met by donations

Vikram became convinced that for micro-finance to be able to affect hundreds of millions of people, it had to be able to attract investment capital, which meant that he had to find a way for micro-finance to be profitable. His company - SKS Microfinance - has succeeded in attracting investment from top venture capital firms by finding innovative approaches to how loans are granted and managed. Starting on a shoestring in 1997, SKS has grown exponentially to the point that by 2006 it had granted $75 MILLION in loans and was approaching 2 MILLION members. It has an astonishing 98% repayment rate, yet it's interest rates (while high by "first world" standards) are among the lowest in India.

This book (and SKS) is a great example of "doing well by doing good". I highly recommend it!