Microfinance programs are often characterized by progressive lending. A typical borrower receives at first very small amounts, which increase with good repayment conduct. The author rationalizes this feature of microfinance. It is shown that there is a strong tendency to split up projects into...

Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Contents -- Foreword -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- About the Authors -- Chapter 1: Introduction -- 1.1 Fighting Poverty -- 1.2 Investing in Financial Infrastructure -- 1.3 Content Overview -- Notes -- Chapter 2: Microfinance - the Concept -- 2.1 History --...

The World Bank is a genuine investment agency. This fact seems to be self-evident, yet not fully realized by a larger public. At present, the World Bank (IBRD), together with its affiliate, the International Development Association (IDA), is also a multilateral development institution, the...

Japan has an impressive history when it comes to aid, industrial policy, and infrastructure development, both as a country that saw meteoric development of its own, and as a country that has been one of the world's largest donors for decades. Looking towards an uncertain future in which...

China’s provision of development finance to other countries is sizable but reliable information is scarce. We introduce a new open source methodology for collecting project-level development finance information and create a database of Chinese official finance to Africa from 2000 - 2011. We...

China's importance as a major donor outside the traditional Western donors has been increasing and this has helped to bridge the funding gaps in developing countries. At the same time, South-South financial assistance still comes with less conditionality making China's aid model different to...

The use of challenge funds to promote economic and social development continues to grow, but has been the subject of relatively little research. This paper develops a definition of what challenge funds are and how they differ from other development funding mechanisms, taking into account their...