Microfinance is generally seen as a way to fix credit markets and unleash the productive capacities of poor people who … are dependent on self-employment. The microfinance sector has grown quickly since the 1990s, paving the way for other …, generating a backlash against microfinance. This paper reconsiders the claims about microfinance, highlighting the diversity in …

Interventions aimed at increasing the income generating capacity of the poor, such as vocational training, micro-finance … communities in Nicaragua. On average, the interventions resulted in increased participation in non-agricultural employment and …

Microfinance is often criticized for not adequately addressing seasonality and hard-core poverty. In Bangladesh, a … program known as PRIME was introduced in 2006 to address both concerns. Unlike regular microfinance, PRIME introduces a … microfinance scheme that offers a flexible repayment schedule and consumption smoothing, as well as production, loans. It targets …

This paper describes a new index of the quality of the business environment for microfinance institutions (the Global … Microscope on the Microfinance Business Environment). Regressions are used to validate the index by linking it and its … subcomponents to microfinance outcomes. The main findings are that the components of the index related to the supporting …