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. From there you can cash out, or lend it out again to another person in need.



Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times visits his loan recipient: a baker in Kabul. This is a wonderful 3 minute video that quickly shows the human aspect of Kiva!



The Wall Street Journal, CNN, NPR, The New York Times; Check out what the media has been saying about Kiva:
http://www.kiva.org/about/press/

Watch PBS' FRONTLINE WORLD segment about Kiva:
http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/uganda601/video_index.html

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Official Kiva web site - http://www.kiva.org
Official Kiva MySpace - http://www.myspace.com/kivaloans
Official Kiva Friendster - http://friendster.com/kivaloans
Official Kiva Yahoo Group - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kivaloans

Hi All,

This is my first post since I discovered this "Kivafriends.org" Forum.  I joined Kiva recently and very enthusiastic about it and spreading the word around for others to Lend via Kiva.org.

I felt the need for such a furum a "Lenders Forum" to be on Kiva.org web site, so that lenders and other stakeholders can post their comments, questions, etc.  But only when I suggested this to Kiva.org SMT, I got their reply with the website address of Kiva Friends.  I am sure many Kiva lenders may not know about Kivafriends.org forum.   

I am wondering why Kiva does not have the link of Kivafriend.org on their website?  Do any one of you (or Kiva)know the answer to this?  It will be very much appreciated if Kiva.org include Kivafriends.org linknk on their websit asap.

Thanks

They've re-done their Get Involved section. All of it used to be on one page before! It's more organized now but I can see why people can't easily locate the links to the external options like this forum, Kiva Yahoo and Kiva MySpace.

A full Site Map with all the links found on other pages would help. It took me quite a while to find the KivaFriends link today, after having been here yesterday. Other links are equally difficult to find. Site Map. Think Site Map. 

Do I have to fund a specific loan to fund a new Kiva account? If repaid loans sit in a Kiva "core" account, then can PayPal funds be transferred into a new Kiva account?

I'd like to transfer a lump sum in at the start of each month, for example, but want the whole family to be involved in selecting the entrepreneurs at another time.

Would that fall under suggestion, too?