Thinking Digital conference: Kiva.org

May 23 2008 By Andrew Mernin at The Sage Gateshead

WHILE most fledgling online enterprises target rapid growth in the hope of an eventual multi-million pound sale, Kiva.org was set up with a very different aim in mind.
 
The website’s chief marketing officer Jessica Flannery set up the site after a three-month trip to Africa which changed her life.
 
She visited entrepreneurs who had used small ‘microfinance’ grants to start businesses and realised that entrepreneurial spirit was as strong in the developing world as it is in Silicon Valley.
 
In 2005, Ms Flannery, who took to the stage for the afternoon session of today’s Thinking Digital conference, founded Kiva.org – an organisation that allows other people to lend money via the internet to would-be entrepreneurs in the developing world.
 
In less than three years she has raised US$35m from 300,000 people and today called on the North-East to play its part in the microfinance movement.
 
She said: "We are all very fortunate to be sitting here and there are things we can do in our lives to make a difference.
 
"This is about a personal connection from one human being to another – there’s a real personal exchange.
 
"The joy that I have with this now is the same as it was when I first started with just seven people on board."
 
For more information on microfinance visit these useful websites:
 
:: Microfinance Gateway 
 
:: Kiva  
 
:: Wikipedia