Dear Mr.Parthasarathy and others in this page,

Kindly bear with me for not responding your mails in this page. Somehow I missed the communication.

Parthasarathy has elabarated the Self Help Group programmes. We are already involved in this programme. I herewith submit a short write up for your kind information.

With warm regards,

James.

Micro Credit Programme in the City slums in Madurai

City slums are mainly constituted with the migrants from the surrounding villages for want of job opportunity in the city. Most of them are uneducated and so they will be employed in the low salaried works in the city. With the minimum wages they are in a hard situation to run the show. Private moneylenders are always ready to lend loan for the slum people. With the necessity to get things done, slum people use to get loan from these money lenders without minding about the rate of interest or conditions for the repayment and failure to repayment. If the loan is repaid with high interest, there will not be any problem. If not, the slum community faced very worst situation. Some families have lost all that they belonged and to certain extent some family lost their family members too.

This situation was brought to the attention of a few social workers, whom decided to minimize the intervention of the private money lenders. The first step was decided to form the slum community as groups. The groups decided to involve in savings and the saved money was circulated among them.

. Apart from their own savings amount which was spent for the emergency needs of the family, it was also provided with some external assistance to make them involve in the economical development programme to make them self supportive and independent. Thus the Micro Credit Programme was started five years ago in the city slums in Madurai.

Twelve to twenty members constitute one group in the slum and thus sixty-three one groups from twenty-seven slums were formed. There are a total number of 918 number of members is functioning in these groups. They have Savings among themselves the collected money is circulated among themselves with an interest rate of 2% per month. Altogether they have Rs. 12,36,500/- which is circulated among themselves.

Apart from their own money, the organisation has also lent .Rs 21,14,000/- for the past five years for 439 members as micro credit for the Self Help Group Members. For getting this loan the Group should recommend. Member who intends to get this loan should give an application, which will be discussed and submitted to the Office with its recommendation. The Quantum of Loan is Rs. 5,000/- and the main purpose of the loan is to involve the borrower in economic development programmes. The loan money along with interest (2% diminishing) should be repaid by ten equal monthly instilments. The Group also takes the responsibility for proper repayment.
The borrowers are involved in the following Economic Development Programmes:

-Cloth Vending
-Idly Shop
-Flower Vending
-Rice Grinding
-Tea Shop
-Pappadam making
-Rice Vending
-Petty Shop
-vegetable Vending
-mini Bakery
-Dryfish vending
-frueit vending
-Tailoring
-Soap powder making
-Sugar Cane Juice
-Grocery Shop
-Basket making
The money received as loan has paved the way to minimize the intervention of the private money lenders and the repayment rate is 99.28% and so the system is good in its nature.
With this background, we are planning to raise the quantum of loan to Rs. 10,000/- per member. As in certain programmes it needs more money to invest and the members have agreed to repay this amount in ten equal instilments.

Hi everyone,

I would be interested in helping out research Global Giving.

I have had a brief look at the website, and there is a detailed FAQ section which may be of help:
http://www.globalgiving.com./help.html

I will see if the answers provided on that document answer the questions that have been posted here regarding the application procedure.

If not, I can always contact Global Giving directly and ask for their guidance.

Is anybody else working on this? If so, we can always join forces! :-)

I'll be back soon!

Romina

Hi neighbours,

I'm not sure if this has been brought up before, but the following link leads to background information on how projects are published on Globalgiving.com.

http://www.globalgiving.com./dd.html

I tried to access the 'Nonprofits' section of the website, but it is soleley for organizations who currently have a working agreement with Globalgiving.com.

However, I did find this disclaimer:
"GlobalGiving's strategy is to host only those projects that are authenticated by a select number of partner organizations, and have been verified to meet the requirements of both our donors and federal legislation. Currently, only those programs allied with our partner organizations will be able to post projects. "

It looks like we would need a sponsor to have the project published.

As I'm new to the village, has this issue been addressed? Is there a way to bypass it?

Thanks!
Romina

Hi Romina,
How are you? So we would need a sponsor....I've contacted global giving about the process but they have not gotten back to me yet. Maybe we could try contacting the partner org. about sponsoring us. What do you think? We could also look into similar websites that might be easier to publish on.

Best,
Kristin

I have contacted one Ms Dana of Globalgiving. Following is the text reply which i recieved. May be from this You can makeout something.

Hi Angelina,

Thank you for your interest in GlobalGiving. Perhaps it would help to explain how projects get on the GlobalGiving site.

GlobalGiving sources projects for its Web site through a system of "Project Sponsors." These are mainly US-based 501(c)(3) organizations that perform due diligence on projects in the developing world, then "vouch" for them on the GlobalGiving Web site. We accept new project sponsors in early spring and new projects throughout the summer.

We encourage organizations that carry out their own projects and that would like to be a part of GlobalGiving to explore our list of Project Sponsors for organizations they may already have a relationship with. For a complete list, please visit http://www.globalgiving.com/aboutds.html

If you know of any organizations that you believe would be a good Project Sponsor, please let us know.

Best wishes,

Dana

This is what i have recieved. we need sponsors who can help us.

bye
Angelina

Hi everyone,

Thanks for the info, Angelina.

I looked at the link of sponsors provided.

A lot of sponsors deal with environmental issues, economic development and business planning.

Would the proposed driving school be considered a business, or a not-for-profit? (if it's the latter, I'm not sure under which sponsor the project could be sponsored by- any ideas?)

Romina

Hi Kristin,

I'm doing well - now that it's Friday! :-)

I can certainly contact the partner organizations.

Unless Angelina is doing so? (if she is, I'd be glad to help if she needs me)

I think it's essential to know if the sponsorship is realistic, or if we ought to try having the project published on another site, which may be easier.

I'll keep an eye out for other websites too..

Have a great weekend!

Romina

Hi Romina,
A rep from Global Giving emailed me back:

-Currently, the primary way to post a project on GlobalGiving is through a network of sponsors who vet each project for eligibility along the lines of the US international guidelines for philanthropy, help project leaders enter their projects, and assist in providing feedback to donors. Every year we offer organizations not affiliated with project sponsors the ability to post projects. We are currently revising these guidelines and will get back to you in the next 2 months. I have added your name to my list and you will receive an email when this goes up. We are committed to opening up access to groups that do not have sponsors.-

So she will let me know. But if you can contact the sponsors, I will look into similiar organizations. Is anyone else interested in looking into these 2 options?

Best,
Kristin

Hi Angelina,
How are you? Thanks for helping us with this. Do you think you can look into a few of the sponsors and see what kind of projects they work with? If any of the sponsors are interested in projects similiar to ours, we should make sure to concentrate our efforts there!

Also, I would like to know what everyone thinks about looking into Nabuur as a sponsor?

Best,
Kristin

i was searching the detail activities of some organisations to get the exact one for our project, so i didnot respond quickly to Romina.

Below is a link of an organisation which works out for economic development activities. Also if anyone of you can take a step forward with my step, we can work wonders in helping Madurai. All by myself would definitely be slow. Hand in hand work gives quick results.

http://www.trickleup.org/contact.html

Happy weekend

Bye
Angelina

Hi Angelina,
Thanks so much for your recommendation. Could you look into the Trickle up and report back on any funding opportunities? Maybe you can contact them on our behalf? Hope everyone is well.

Best,
Kristin

I want some help from james. i would like to know on what lines i need to contact trickleup.

bye
angelina

Dear Angelina,

Trickleup is basically a funding organisation which funds for income generation programme. As you are aware we are involved with microcredit programme for the slum community for which we can ask assistance from Trickleup. Hope you have gone the document that I sent regarding the microcredit activities in the slums in Madurai.

With warm regards,
James.

Hello everyone,
Hi James. Is the organization Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund one that would consider funding our project? If so, how will this work. You informed that you will need support from an organization based in the US. What kind of support would you need the Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund to provide? I am familiar with many non-profits here in the US. Please let me know what I can do.

Hi Angelina, any news about Trickle Up? I will look into a few other prospective funders also.

Best,
Kristin

the organisation need to be registered in US under section 501 (C) (3) and willing to sponsor our project. If you can contact any such organisation, it would be of great help. Moreover then such an US-based 501(C) (3) registered organisation can place our requirements in the GlobalGiving.com website. This is what Ms Dana of globalgiving.com was saying.

bye
angelina