Posted on December 17, 2009 - by James

Grameen: Using Technology to Advance the Fight against Global Poverty

Microfinance has grown tremendously in the last decade, moving from little NGOs working in tiny villages to large institutions providing loans, savings accounts and insurance to hundreds of thousands of poor women and men.  Grameen Bank in Bangladesh alone has more than seven million clients, while institutions like Grameen Koota in India serve more than 300,000.  In fact, according to the Microcredit Summit Campaign there are more than 3,300 microfinance institutions (MFIs) providing services to more than 155 million poor people and their families globally.

As these MFIs have grown, so has their need for technology to help them manage their overall business operations. Technology plays a key role in Grameen Foundation’s mission to alleviate poverty.  From equipping MFIs with the capacity to manage technology to building and delivering industry-wide solutions like the Mifos™ platform, our goal is to advance the use of technology so all MFIs can better serve more of the world’s poor.

We have seen a promising shift in technology use among MFIs over the past five years. Surveys by theConsultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP) show that the share of MFIs leveraging technology to manage their operations grew from less than 50 percent in 2004 to roughly 72 percent in 2009.   Still, we believe the spread of technology can be accelerated in two significant ways…

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