Made my Kiva micro-loan for the month of June

I made a new micro-loan through Kiva for the month of June. My intention is to make a new micro-loan every month, in large part from repayments for past micro-loans.

This one was for a group of 18 micro-entrepreneurs in Tanzania who are making furniture. It is a 6-month micro-loan for a total of $4,550, of which I lent $25. The money is to be used to buy leather, cloth for sofas, and varnish for wood. Its first repayment is scheduled for August 2009. The micro-loan was already disbursed to the micro-entrepreneur group on May 27, 2009 by the local partner. Kiva is raising funds to essentially buy that loan from the local partner.

Here is my Kiva public lender page: http://www.kiva.org/lender/JackKrupansky

Note: This is all real and good, but these micro-loans do not net any interest to us micro-lenders. Kiva's fine print:

Lending to the working poor through Kiva involves risk of principal loss.
Kiva does not guarantee repayment nor do we offer a financial return on your loan.

Still, at least we know our money is really helping somebody better their lives in a visible way rather than put the money in a bank account or money market fund where who knows what it helps to pay for or what good it does and for only a few pennies of profit in our pockets.

-- Jack Krupansky