Kiva.org is an organisation that describes itself thus:

Kiva lets you connect with and loan money to unique small businesses in the developing world. By choosing a business on Kiva.org, you can “sponsor a business” and help the world’s working poor make great strides towards economic independence. Throughout the course of the loan (usually 6-12 months), you can receive email journal updates from the business you’ve sponsored. As loans are repaid, you get your loan money back.

This seems to me like a fantastic example of how web 2.0 and the broader (and more important) ethos of openness and connectedness that it represents can make real difference in the world. In an hour or so of web surfing I can read about individual business people in developing countries. From there I pick a few individuals (who make up my loan portfolio) and transfer some funds via PayPal. Now I am a micro-lender, with a part of my tax refund cash helping entrepreneurs on three continents build up their businesses to (hopefully) lift their families out of poverty.

I don’t know a great deal about micro-lending other than snippets I’ve heard about its effectiveness (in fact I haven’t even read the Wikipedia entry yet), but this just feels right. I’ve ordered a book on the subject to try to improve my knowledge, but for now I’m happy to be an uninformed micro-lender.

Credit to the TorCamp chat swarm, Marc Rigaux in particular, for reminding me that Kiva exists, right at tax refund time too.