Troy Cherry's Profile

Microcredit is the extension of very small loans (microloans) to those in poverty designed to spur entrepreneurship. These individuals lack collateral, steady employment and a verifiable credit history and therefore cannot meet even the most minimal qualifications to gain access to traditional credit. Microcredit is a part of microfinance, which is the provision of a wider range of financial services to the very poor. “Dr. Akhtar Hameed Khan pioneered microcredit through the Comilla cooperative program at Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (previously known as Pakistan Academy for Rural Development) in the early 1960s. Professor Yunus later used these principles to establish Grameen Bank in Bangladesh.”

Microcredit is a financial innovation that is generally considered to have originated with the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh.^[1] In that country, it has successfully enabled extremely impoverished people to engage in self-employment projects that allow them to generate an income and, in many cases, begin to build wealth and exit poverty.^{[citation needed]} Due to the success of microcredit, many in the traditional banking industry have begun to realize that these microcredit borrowers should more correctly be categorized as pre-bankable; thus, microcredit is increasingly gaining credibility^{[citation needed]} in the mainstream finance industry, and many traditional large finance organizations are contemplating microcredit projects as a source of future growth, even though almost everyone in larger development organizations discounted the likelihood of success of microcredit when it was begun. The United Nations declared 2005 the International Year of Microcredit.

We Let You Loan to Low Income Entrepreneurs

Kiva's mission is to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty.

Kiva is the world's first person-to-person micro-lending website, empowering individuals to lend to unique entrepreneurs around the globe.

The people you see on Kiva's site are real individuals. When you browse entrepreneurs' profiles on Kiva,
choose someone to lend to, and then make a loan, you are helping a real person make great strides towards economic independence
and improve life for themselves, their family, and their community. Throughout the course of the loan (usually 6-12 months), you can receive
email journal updates and track repayments. Then, when you get your loan money back, you can relend to someone else.

Kiva partners with existing microfinance institutions.
In doing so, we gain access to entrepreneurs from communities world-wide.
Our partners are experts in choosing qualified entrepreneurs. That said, they are usually short on funds.
Through Kiva, our partners upload their entrepreneur profiles directly to the site so you can lend to them.
When you do, not only do you get a unique experience connecting to a specific entrepreneur on the other side of the planet,
but our microfinance partners can do more of what they do, more efficiently.

Kiva provides a data-rich, transparent lending platform.
We are constantly working to make the system more transparent to show how money flows throughout the entire cycle,
and what effect it has on the people and institutions lending it, borrowing it, and managing it along the way. To do this,
we are using the power of the internet to facilitate one-to-one connections that were previously prohibitively expensive.
Kiva creates an interpersonal connection at low costs due to the instant, inexpensive nature of internet delivery.

History

In the 1st century AD, the site of St. Peter's Basilica hosted the Circus of Nero and a cemetery. According to ancient tradition, St. Peter was martyred in the Circus and buried nearby. His simple grave was remembered and visited by the faithful, and in 324, Emperor Constantine began construction on a great basilica over the tomb. The shrine of St. Peter is still the central focus of the church today.

In the mid-15th century it was decided that the old basilica should be rebuilt. Pope Nicholas V asked architect Bernardo Rossellino to start adding to the old church. This was abandoned after a short while, but in the late 15th century Pope Sixtus IV had the Sistine Chapel started nearby.

Construction on the current building began under Pope Julius II in 1506 and was completed in 1615 under Pope Paul V. Donato Bramante was to be the first chief architect. Many famous artists worked on the "Fabbrica di San Pietro" (as the complex of building operations were officially called). Michelangelo, who served as main architect for a while, designed the dome, and Bernini designed the great St. Peter's Square.