Success Stories from Our Members in the field

Microlending in Bolivia Breaking Cycle of Poverty, ACCION International

Millions of the world's poor lack access to the financial services needed to move up the economic and social ladder. In Bolivia, for example, it was unthinkable that a poor person might apply for and receive a business loan as recently as 15 years ago. That has changed, due in large part to the efforts of ACCION International, an American nongovernmental organization, and its partner institutions.

The story began in 1986, when ACCION and Bolivian business leaders established PRODEM, a nonprofit lender making very small but high-impact loans to microenterprises-- the tiny businesses started by the poor to provide for their families.

Within a few years, PRODEM grew so rapidly that it outstripped the capacity of the local banking sector to supply it with lending capital. In response, ACCION joined with other investors in 1992 to launch BancoSol.

The world's first private commercial bank dedicated exclusively to the poor, the majority of whom were engaged in microenterprise, BancoSol offers a comprehensive range of financial services for the microenterprise household, including seven unique loan products and savings services.

Today, BancoSol serves nearly 60,000 microentrepreneurs, 60 percent of them women. With an active lending portfolio of over $79 million and repayment rate of 97 percent, BancoSol has demonstrated that poor entrepreneurs can and do pay back their loans. BancoSol is profitable, and is consistently rated among the top banks in Bolivia.

The loans help the self-employed poor to raise income levels, generate assets and work their way out of poverty. A BancoSol study showed that the incomes of borrowers increased 216 percent more than those of non-borrowers.

Additionally, BancoSol's success has paved the way for other Bolivian institutions to enter the microenterprise market, making it one of the most developed in the world. Today, Bolivians can access financial services through a number of competing microfinance institutions. Thanks to the pioneering work of ACCION International and BancoSol, Bolivia's poor now have greater opportunities for economic advancement and self-sufficiency.