I feel supportive of the ideals and goals... the spirit in which this is approached. My only hesitation is the rosy picture of all things Marshall.

I do welcome a Global Marshall Plan that focuses on the key issues of the development plan.

I have been involved in microfinance which does provide opportunities. I just would like to see the interest rates on these loans reduced substantially in order to utilize the dollars more effectively for those taking out the loans.

I am a bit frustrated by the logic on higher interest rates and think that we as a community can do something to make it more reasonable.

I would rather see the reduction of the rates but if not would like to see a percentage of the interest collected to be redistributed in a community based program.

Might we agree that a modern day Marshall Plan would be substantially different in that it would be microeconomic in principle and rather than focusing on industrial re-development it should be aimed at our information societal development?

Yes, microfinance can be very expensive. Just recently I was looking at the local partner rates on Kiva which vary from 1 to 30 percent. Is this due to costly management and might it be improved by leaning further toward self-managed variants I wonder?

The information on Kiva addressing the high interest rate is posted below:

6. Why are microcredit interest rates so high?

The nature of microcredit – small loans – is such that interest rates need to be high to return the cost of the loan.

"There are three kinds of costs the MFI has to cover when it makes microloans.

The first two, the cost of the money that it lends and the cost of loan defaults, are proportional to the amount lent. For instance, if the cost paid by the MFI for the money it lends is 10%, and it experiences defaults of 1% of the amount lent, then these two costs will total $11 for a loan of $100, and $55 for a loan of $500. An interest rate of 11% of the loan amount thus covers both these costs for either loan.

The third type of cost, transaction costs, is not proportional to the amount lent. The transaction cost of the $500 loan is not much different from the transaction cost of the $100 loan. Both loans require roughly the same amount of staff time for meeting with the borrower to appraise the loan, processing the loan disbursement and repayments, and follow-up monitoring.

Suppose that the transaction cost is $25 per loan and that the loans are for one year. To break even on the $500 loan, the MFI would need to collect interest of $50 + 5 + $25 = $80, which represents an annual interest rate of 16%.

To break even on the $100 loan, the MFI would need to collect interest of $10 + 1 + $25 = $36, which is an interest rate of 36%.

At first glance, a rate this high looks abusive to many people, especially when the clients are poor. But in fact, this interest rate simply reflects the basic reality that when loan sizes get very small, transaction costs loom larger because these costs can't be cut below certain minimums." (CGAP)

OK, Now if we take into account that Kiva supplies money at no interest, then that first part of the equation can be largely eliminated aside from operational costs. Then consider an average loan of $1000 and a local MFI rate of 30%, the small transaction issue should also be diminished?

Sleeping on this....

A Global Marshall Plan under a different name?

A Call to Action with Former President William Jefferson Clinton at the 2007 Global Philanthropy Forum.

I found this worth listening to as it covered a number of the topics raised here and there is even action in some cases.

Nicholas,

There's more that a little coincidence here, if you consider where I'm coming from with the work of a former Clinton researcher, as you'll see in the History section of our website http://www.p-ced.com.

For the cost of War vs Peace argument you may also read the the Crimea proposal. I'm about halfway through and will continue listening.

Jeff

What we have to do is establish predictable connections for people that are just as smart hard working and as imaginative creative smart as we are. To take it to scale that's what I would do. I would have the international organizations, philanthropic networks, the national governments, and developing and developed countries alike actively solicit, be involved in, and catalogue opportunities for involvement.

Muhammad Yunus, Bill Drayton...these are the kinds of people I think we should be lifting up around the world. People who have shown that it is possible to change the way we all live. We need more explicit long term partnerships with international organizations, national governments and developed and developing countries with the big NGO umbrella groups, that's how we've got to take it to scale.

There are all these people with a lot of money, generally well disposed, then there are all these people that just have a little bit and would like to give every week but they don't know for sure if will make a difference, so anything we can do to systematically both leverage the impact of the contribution and show people it will make a difference and be held accountable in a scorable way for results will accelerate this movement.

Bill Clinton: A Call to Action

What's difficult for me to take in is what is really going on in a total perspective. There's the impression of large effort being expended competing for the donor dollar and many organisations with like aims working in the same places. I think that's the kind of thing David Bale is trying to work our in his apportionment of poverty.

How do we ascertain which orgs are delivering best value to be sure that we're backing the best bet for a solution. I wonder?

Big orgs, NPO's and NGO's often do not want to collaborate or share what's working. That is their secret sauce that gets them individual donors and foundation and corporate grants.

Small grassroots organizations would love to collaborate and often times do no mind at all sharing what works, where, and how. And what didn't work too for that matter.

More funds and attention to smaller grassroots groups working transparently, collaborating and openly sharing information...could eventually put pressure on bigger orgs to do the same thing.

It amazes me the numerous organizations out there working on a variety of different causes but what I am not seeing is a willingness to work with others.

I am finding this with my own experience of trying to set up school fees in Uganda for primary, secondary and a scholarship for a university it's been a challenge.

Everyone seems to have their own focus and even when education is listed as one of them, no one seems to want to share in getting this goal accomplished.

Even in trying to sponsor children for an education the organizations that are out there want their own children sponsored and don't want to assist. Here they have a donor with specific names and schools to attend but they can't seem to bring themselves to work with an individual.

The truth is there are many individuals out there wanting to make a difference and have the funds to back it up but there isn't the support in getting this done effectively.

This is only one small area and if you attempt to multiply it by all the causes out there, you can see why things aren't being done efficiently to diminish the problems being addressed.

I would love to see a network of individuals coming together for a common cause and getting the job done.

I'll offer another example. More than a year ago I became aware of a severe humanitarian problem involving children in institutions, basically being locked away to die.

We've been in dialogue with 4 orgs who'll relate their experience of observing this.

We campaigned to raise awareness, making the point that a social "Marshall Plan" would be needed and that among the funding options would be an MCC Compact with the US govt. We'd spent 3 years developing a plan to justify this large scale investment but couldn't include this major issue.

The reason being, that none of these orgs would step forward and verify what we'd described. They had projects planned, investment in airfares and feared being locked out for rocking the boat too hard. We could refer to their findings as long as all names and locations were removed.

Then a malevolent force stepped in sensing that there might be large scale funds involved . Realising this lack of support they began to claim our reporting was fabricated, that our organisation was fraudulent. Having obtained a copy of our work by deception they began a smear blog through the medium of Google. I can do absolutely nothing about this other than blog myself, that "Evil thrives when Google people do nothing"

We kept on top of this, however offering the plan without reference to this problem but with the condition that their govt. take action for disabled children, those left to die.

They agreed. hence we have the bizarre situation where a government proposes action on a social problem that does not exist. it begins in the city of Kharkiv where the project would be centered.

http://www.kmu.gov.ua/control/en /publish/article?art_id=69671033 &cat_id=32598

Is the picture beginning to emerge?

Now back to the orgs. Another appeared last week with stories of children locked up and left to die. I put it to them straight, it's their name that's needed, either as an individual or the religious group they act for. We beg and plead for these people to understand that protecting their own interests is immoral, that they need to grasp the bigger picture.

It's beyond comprehension because everything we're being encouraged to do is to "make a difference" without regard to each other or the overall problem, which could be eliminated in a very short time, otherwise the only sustainability we create is a constant supply of misery to deal with.

I do understand your frustration with what you experience in your situation. It seems to be a common place occurrence and I'm not sure why people can't play well with others.

I don't know if it's a fear that a particular organization will lose the spotlight on their own objectives but my feeling is that in not seeing the vision of the big picture only hinders the overall progress. I do believe that positive progress is the main goal for all of us trying to make a difference on a variety of different issues.

Maybe there are just too many egos involved to make this happen but I would like to see the community come together to overcome this and I feel so much more could be accomplished in reaching our goals.

There are thousands of organizations out there and on the surface it seems that there are mutual goals yet why is it so challenging to work together to make things happen?

How can we all come together to get so much more done?

Alexandria B. said:

It amazes me the numerous organizations out there working on a variety of different causes but what I am not seeing is a willingness to work with others.

Hello Alexandria,

The problem in the above statement and perhpas, the solution as well,lies in the fact that many who want to "help" the less privileged want to select the way, manner and people they work with even in environments and areas they do not understand anything about. I am talking from experience. I have met many so-called charity workers here in Africa who want to work with you on their own terms,even though they know absolutely nothing about the environment and people they are "helping"( as though you and them were fighting for the Nobel prize).

My opinion is that there is too much hypocrisy in the system both with the so-called foreign workers, charity organisations,many of the locals they meet here and in every sector conceivable. In the end, the big companies rather see micro-finance as a way of exploitaion..er...sorry..making charitable profits from the people they are suppossed to be helping.

Did we forget to mention that aside from the interest rates, the micro-finance orgs also require sound collateral which many times the people are not able to provide? Of course, they will always tell you no collateral is required, but dare apply and you will get thrown out though the window. Well, these days, some few honest exploiters..er...sorry.. microfinance companies over here in africa are telling the truth from the beginning and declaraing hostility from the start without applicant collateral.

And if I must add,there is far too much talk going among the grassroots. The bigger players do more of acting and less of talking.

Hi Gabriel,

I see the truth in what you are expressing. I realize there are many organizations out there that do an incredible job and there are some other organizations that take advantage of the situation.

What I was looking for in terms of a working relationship is that I already have personal projects that are in need of support and was unable to find an organization willing to assist me in the process.

I've come to two conclusions. First, the projects I have are personal and it's up to me to make things happen. Sometimes how we visualize things taking place are not necessarily the way they are meant to happen so one must always be open to new perceptions.

Second, since this post, I have been blessed to connect with a couple of organizations that I feel do a tremendous job in serving the community needs. I do feel networking is essential and can work successfully if there is open communication and a sharing of ideas that best serves the community.

We could certainly do with more help, in our smaller scale efforts. We can all be leaner and more tightly focused than the large scale NGOs who often just won't communicate at all.

A handful of well intentioned billionaires aren't going to deliver the solutions on their own, but they could empower us the small players and start the ball rolling. This isn't happening from where I sit.

For example, we could continue with all these funding competitions which tie up our resources and leave the majority wanting. With so many advocates for helping poor people toward self-empowerment, do we encourage them to compete with each other for micro-loans? Surely it's more the case of examining each on it's merits and feasibility, so why can't the same approach be adopted towards those that struggle to make their difference?

I'm sometimes astonished at how obstructive it can be. On Thursday, I'm going to a seminar entitled "Moving from grants to trade". We've never applied for a grant, depending totally on trade, so I'm going just to discover why it's not working as well as it could.

I have my own views. As an illustration, one of my long term debtors is a government department set up as a charity. Know as The British Council, they deploy large resources overseas toward education and social development, even sponsoring one of the new social enterprise advocacy networks. They above all should understand our mission, but they haven't paid our invoice since last October, in violation of all government principles on prompt payment.

As I observe this new advocacy planning an overseas conference, would anyone be surprised at me feeling that I'd funded it personally?

Yes, Alexandria. I wonder where he missing link is in all this. How come many sincere and hardorking people inclined toward poverty eradication never get noticed or are side-tracked? Sometimes, it's really because some goals are more of personal goals, but other times, it's not. Those who have not received support must be missing it somehwere...perhaps??

So one wonders "what is he best way to receive support for one's objective? What's the best way to gain recognition?"

Put the little P.R. Princess on the job....... (see below!)

Hey guys.......... a momentary break in transmission !!!

Gabriel,

That is a very good question. I can respond from my own experience and say that I consciously make an effort to look around and see where the needs are.

It's a bit challenging on a forum because of the lack of indexing so visibility for some projects go unseen. I would like to see clear visibility of profit vs. non-profit in the organizations description.

I also feel that if there are organizations out there that state they are addressing some of the issues but I see a lack of financial accountability.

Clearly defined objectives and a way to measure the progress of the projects does bring in more support. Open honest communication is key to building trust in a relationship.

Alexandria,

Can you elaborate on what you'd hope to see in terms of visibility?