Financial bootstraps for the disenfranchised.

• Author: Ayres, Ed
• Position: Summit meeting on work security

An unusual kind of "summit" meeting, to take place in Washington, D.C. next February, could mark a turning point in the steady erosion of work security that has hounded the global economy in recent years. Unlike the Earth Summit and the Women's Summit, which established broad strategies for sustainable development, the planned "Microcredit Summit" will focus on a single tool that could stimulate work opportunities in much the same way that the development of microcomputers stimulated the global processing of information. By providing viable alternatives to employment by larger companies and the public sector, small (1-person or 2-person) "microenterprises" - if adequately financed - offer a proven means of enabling people to work gainfully.

As noted in an article by Hal Kane in the March/April World Watch, lending institutions in a number of countries, beginning with the Grameen Bank of Bangladesh in the 1970s, have established methods by which financing can be provided, without charitable aid, to impoverished people who would not qualify for credit with conventional banks. With a two-decade track record proving that even uncollateralized loans often achieve payback records of 99 percent, the stage has been set for a major expansion of credit to disenfranchised workers - particularly women, who have had difficulty...