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Tiniest of Loans Bring Big Payoff, Aid Group Says
By KIRK SEMPLE

Published: November 3, 2003

UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 2 — An organization that promotes small loans for self-employment projects among the world's poorest people plans to announce here on Monday that it is on track to meet its nine-year goal of helping 100 million of the world's poorest families by 2005.

The organization, Results Educational Fund, will report that as of the end of 2002, more than 2,500 institutions offering small-scale financial assistance, known as microcredit, have reached 41.6 million poor families worldwide. They were made to finance a vast array of businesses. including a Pakistani baker of papadum bread, a bicycle rickshaw agency in Bangladesh, a tortilla maker in El Salvador and a lawn-care business in South Florida. ...