Click here to watch new video on credit-suisse.com featuring Opportunity's technological innovations in Malawi, and the impact they have on the lives and businesses of rural clients like Ellen Patrick (pictured).

In addition, Credit Suisse has just completed a new video, “Banking on Wheels in Malawi,” about their visit to Opportunity Malawi’s microfinance operations. It features two very compelling client stories, interviews with Alefa Mtungia (south regional manager) and Antoni Musonzo (a loan officer from Blantyre), and highlights our mobile banking strategy, including cell phones, ATMs, biometric fingerprint technology, and more. It also emphasizes the importance of financial literacy, especially regarding savings. Finally, you can also find Opportunity featured on Credit Suisse’s Corporate Responsibility homepage.

We’re grateful for institutional strategic partners like Credit Suisse and for contributors like you who make it possible to bring life-changing opportunity to people living in extreme poverty around the world.

This breakout session highlighted just a few of the innovative solutions to fighting poverty that have been implemented in Nicaragua, Colombia, and Ghana.

David Allman began the session talking about the program he has been a part of as chairman of Opportunity Nicaragua. At the agricultural level, the program in Nicaragua involves granting loans for farming, as well as training farmers to become local leaders and influence improvements in their communities’ infrastructure. They have also brought in a low-technology processing plant to help them add value to their crops. For instance, he showed us a yucca plant, and explained that, with the help of the low-tech processing, they were able to introduce to the farmers ways of increasing their crop yields and new usages for different product types.

In Nicaragua, they also try to promote community initiatives to build local leaders who are both competent and aspirational. They help these communities identify their own needs and find ways to implement solutions. Since then, they have created their own roofing and road repair projects, and have felt empowered enough to visit their city government and demand necessary changes. Allman finished by talking about the impact this has had on the communities, and how the citizens are so motivated by their accomplishments that they are excited to ask, “What can we do next?!”

Craig DeRoy, founder and CEO of Medeem, talked about his company’s service of bringing land rights to those who live in poverty. They work to formalize the land rights process for those who are unable to do so on their own. He explained that most countries have land records, but that they’re unused and inaccessible for the poor. Medeem has created a self-sustaining local enterprise called ParcelCert to allow for a cost-effective and accessible solution for individuals to own land and feel empowered. They have primarily been working in Ghana, and are working on a model that will be scalable for other communities.

The last presentation was by Jim Frantz. He talked about their program, “A Roof and a Floor for My Home.” Couldn’t get more direct of a title than that! The objectives of this pilot program were to 1) improve the quality of life, 2) provide access to technical expertise, 3) take advantage of lower costs of materials, labor, etc. and 4) strengthen family relations within the community. This pilot program has been successful so far, and he mentions specific cases of women who have built solid homes for their families. “There’s just something about a mother being able to provide security for her kids,” Frantz says. He also talked about a woman named Astrid Suarez who has been providing her technical expertise to the program, and unfortunately was unable to make it to the conference to share her on-the-ground local experience.

This was an interesting breakout session to learn about different partnerships Opportunity has been building in order to provide services to people in poverty. I look forward to following up on their activities and seeing the impact they continue to make.

This post was written by Barbie Lucio. Barbie is a member of the San Francisco chapter of YAO and works with philanthropists to create change and impact.

Watch it now:

Want to learn more about Opportunity’s work to improve underserved neighborhood schools in Africa and bring education to more children? Check out the breakout session “Banking on Education” at this year’s fall conference in San Francisco, Oct. 14-Oct. 15. If you can’t be there in person, watch the live video stream of main stage and select breakout sessions. Go to opportunity.org/conference to learn more.

The child of a client in Kampala, Uganda

The daughter of a Rwandan dairy farmer client

Rwanda- What does the future hold for this daughter (left) of a Rwandan farmer living in poverty?

After surviving the genocide, and being given a single cow, the mother and her family slowly have been rebuilding their lives as subsistence dairy farmers, with the help of an Opportunity microloan. Life is hard as all the water and food for the cow must be brought in manually each day on a bicycle or by walking, carrying the burden of heavy water containers for a great distance.

Still, there is optimism about the future. The single cow has given birth to three additional cows, two of which the family has kept. The opportunity for improvements in productivity are great, and there is hope for the future.

Rwanda- At a Trust Group meeting (right), an Opportunity client in the rural agricultural village of Nyamata describes how her microloan and the Trust Group have transformed her life by allowing her to buy land, build a house, feed her children, provide schooling, and achieve dignity for herself in her community.

She says that the lessons her loan officer has given her on running a business are very helpful and that her community of friends in the Trust Group give her support and encouragement, helping her solve problems and looking toward the future.

Several of the members of this Trust Group were widowed by the genocide. We saw a monument to the victims on the road, a short distance outside of town.

A Trust Group meeting in the village of Nyamata, Rwanda

Opportunity supporter Fred of Hillsborough, Calif. writes of his journey traveling with fellow supporters and Opportunity staff on an Insight Trip to Rwanda and Uganda in August to see firsthand the impact of our Banking on Africa campaign.

Stay tuned to the Opportunity Blog for more from the Banking on Africa travelers.

In Adomfe, Ghana, Malik Boateng teaches at the Great Owass Educational Complex, one of 120 schools in the IDP Rising Schools Program—a strategic alliance with Opportunity to provide educational loans and capacity building services.

Where poverty is the way of life, people’s potential is often overshadowed by the struggle to survive. But when equipped with the right tools, even the most vulnerable are able to change their own world and create a better future for their children. We stand alongside our clients with a mission to provide those tools—the financial products, educational programs and business training they need to move beyond poverty.

Seemingly simple opportunities like the chance to deposit money, receive a small loan, go to school or learn business skills can become transformative life experiences. Armed with resources and knowledge, our clients grow businesses, develop a steady income and create jobs for their neighbors. They gain confidence and find validation. And their potential to become powerful agents of social and economic change in their family and community is realized.

Banking on Education

Opportunity seeks to increase educational opportunities for children and help strengthen the communities in which we work. To do this, we offer school fee loans to help parents afford tuition, and provide customized business training with long-term loans, averaging $5,000, for school proprietors. These ambitious entrepreneurs scale up their schools by adding classrooms, improving infrastructure and hiring qualified teachers. Opportunity serves nearly 120,000 children with loans to 280 schools in Ghana, Malawi and Uganda.

This piece appeared in Opportunity’s 2010 Annual Report. Explore all its stories and info by clicking here.

Mary Jackson and her husband Humphreys with their three-year old son in Malawi.

At first, Mary was very shy, and wouldn’t look me in the face when I sat down to hear her story. Later, when she took me to see her home and meet her family, her whole demeanor changed. It’s obvious that she is so proud of all she has accomplished since she became an Opportunity client. She is truly an impressive young woman who works hard and uses her innate intelligence and business skills to create a better future for herself and her children. When I think about how little she started with, and what she has been able to accomplish against all odds, it is very humbling to me.

Mary, 25, was orphaned at five years old, and had to drop out of school after sixth grade because there was no one to pay her school fees (education is free only through sixth grade in Malawi). She started doing what she called “casual labor” — project work like cleaning and sewing — until she was married at 15 years old. She and her husband Humphreys have three boys aged eight, six and three. They live in a very poor rural village a half-hour away from Opportunity’s bank branch in Mulanje, which in turn is an hour away from Blantyre.

Mulanje village, which is visited each Monday afternoon by Opportunity’s mobile bank, is filled with red brick houses, most of which do not have indoor plumbing or electricity, and consist of a sparsely furnished main room and a kitchen. When we were there, the children were on winter break and followed us everywhere. One of the boys asked me for a ball, and I dearly wished I had one to give him. In a way, the extreme poverty here feels less overwhelming because of the villagers’ joy over our visit, as well as because of the beautiful landscape with the towering Mulanje Mountain in the distance, set against acre after acre of bright green tea plants, and palm and banana trees. Nonetheless, the poverty is palpable.

Mary and her husband started a used clothing business six years ago but it didn’t produce enough income to meet their needs. The family struggled to put three meals on the table, and lived with relatives because they couldn’t afford a home of their own. Then Mary heard about Opportunity International on the radio and from other Opportunity clients, and applied for her first Trust Group loan of 30,000 kwacha (US$200) to buy more used clothing to sell in the market. She was able to repay her loan within five months.

She is now on her fifth loan of 30,000 kwacha. Today, she purchases new clothing in Blantyre, loads it onto a bicycle and then crosses the border with an employee to sell it in Mozambique where there is less competition. She has also diversified into selling her home-grown maize and produce in the Mathambi Trading Center, and rents out 10 two-bedroom homes that she owns.

Now also a savings client, Mary has received training in savings and vision building so that she will eventually not need loans to grow her business. Mary says she didn’t know how to save before. With credit life insurance from Opportunity, Mary says she feels more secure — a “free spirit” — knowing that her relatives will not be burdened to repay her loan should she die.

Every week or two, Mary visits the mobile bank five minutes from her home. She says that saves her a lot of time and money, which she can invest in her business. Otherwise, she would have to pay $2 each way to go to the Mulanje bank branch. She uses the mobile bank to deposit and withdraw cash and to make her loan repayments. Mary says she is treated well by her loan officer, Antoni Musonzo.

The family now has four meals a day (including tea), fashionable clothing, and can afford school uniforms and books for the children. Mary is very proud that she was able to build a four-bedroom house with an indoor bathroom, a kitchen, sitting room, and their very own well, and the family plans to move to a house with electricity soon.

Mary’s social standing in both her family and her community has increased, and she is considered prosperous by local standards. Now she can help provide for the family, and she and her husband help each other more. Mary receives many visitors and is able to offer them food – something that is very important in the Malawian culture. She serves as secretary of her church, and she also loans money to other community members at no interest and advises them on their businesses. Her business goals are to have a shop in Malawi so that she doesn’t have to travel to Mozambique, and to start a tea farm. Her personal goal is for her children to receive a college education.

It’s always an inspiration to me to meet clients like Mary who have worked so hard and used Opportunity’s microfinance services to improve life for their families and their communities.

Odette Ngonza (left) and Monique Moseka Mwembu (right) have received loans and training from Opportunity DRC Loan Officer Henriette Ndjoka Wembonyama (center). Odette says, "Thanks to Opportunity, we are now a family."

As Opportunity DRC CEO Gilbert Lagaillarde explains, financial training is a key part of providing financial services to clients. “There is a critical need to orient clients to the dynamics of group lending. Clients who expressed disappointment by other loan providers said they didn’t fully understand all aspects of group lending, which led to a lack of trust.” That’s why Opportunity DRC educates each and every client on the services they provide, so that they can get the most out of their loans, effectively breaking free of the limitations of poverty.

Currently, Opportunity DRC has a staff of 32–11 of whom are loan officers. The staff, comprised mostly of university graduates, is subjected to a rigorous recruitment process. Recently, five women graduated from the Goldman Sachs’ 10,000 Women Emerging Leaders Program. This program provided the women with the knowledge and skills they needed to become training managers. One of these women, Nadine Nzenza Pembele, is currently a training officer but aims to continue her education and eventually earn a position as a Human Resource Manager. She has vowed to do her part to make Opportunity the premiere microfinance institution in the DRC, making a difference in the lives of her fellow Congolese citizens.

Since launching our operations, Opportunity DRC has distributed hundreds of loans and has provided in-depth financial training along with each one. In the future, Opportunity DRC will secure its deposit-taking license to begin accepting savings deposits, and they plan to open more branches in Kinshasa.

To learn more about the work of Opportunity DRC and its clients, stay tuned to both the Opportunity Blog and our Facebook page.

Today was the first day of our Colombia Insight Trip. As we boarded our bus, gleaming in the fresh sun, I remember quite clearly a brilliant blue sky. Over the next hour, our bus wound through sloping countrysides of verdant green trees and brick buildings. I surveyed the gentle hills and the mountaintops above neighborhoods of concrete and corrugated metal. The puffy clouds hovered closely above Bogotá, a cuidad at an elevated altitude. As I reflect after a long, fulfilling day, I think that the lay of the land parallels quite well our adventure. I had an idea of the general schedule — the various visits to clients and the discovery of Opportunity’s work. Similarly, I could’ve told you from the weather forecast that it would be a partly cloudy day with temperatures in the mid ’60s. But what I hadn’t prepared for were the stories we would discover tucked into the rolling hills of lush Colombia.

Before my family had travelled on an Insight trip, I had the chance to attend an Opportunity conference where various members of staff explained the process of microfinance and what it was like out in the field. The conference was engaging and informative, but there is something so special about exploring the process for yourself. What I found is that the best thing behind the microfinance process is the people and their stories. It was interviewing young Colombian Daniel, the son of an Opportunity loan officer, in my broken Spanish, and watching his face light up when we both knew about Barcelona futbol. It was hugging a teary elderly woman who was receiving a loan for her chocolate business, as she spoke blessings over us and confessed her deep desire to move her business into a better neighborhood. It was the discovery that a Trust Group leader had bought a cake for us out of her own money, and seeing the sincere gratitude on her face for what Opportunity has done in her life. Before the trip, it had been easy to picture the events of the days ahead. But walking around the Colombian countryside, breathing fresh air and watching beautiful shades of blue dance in the sky above me was something I could not expect. And on a much grander level, I hadn’t imagined the ways the Lord would be working through the hugs, tears, smiles, laughs, and hearts of the people of Colombia. The clients were such wonderful examples of the faith, and truly evidence of Christ working in the world.

So yes, our day went according to schedule. We left on time, ate lunch, met clients, and headed back. But with a celestial sky of memories behind me, I can see now it wasn’t the things we did that made our trip special. It was the experience of a beautiful country, a sincere and welcoming people, and the impact that both impress upon your heart.

Stay tuned to the Opportunity Blog for more updates from the Family Week Trip to Colombia in the coming days ahead.

Rep. Peter Roskam (center) meets with senior members of Opportunity's staff. (From left: Simona Haiduc, Dennis Ripley, Bill Morgenstern and Ruth-Anne Renaud)

In the meeting among Roskam and our senior leadership, they discussed a number of important issues, and Roskam, who visited Opportunity’s microfinance operations in Accra during his March 2011 bipartisan fact-finding trip to Ghana, got to ask more questions about the structure and the impact of our work around the world. As Bill Morgenstern told Roskam, “We see ourselves as a next-generation solutions provider in the microfinance arena, with three key areas of focus: loans, savings, and insurance. But what separates Opportunity from others is the holistic training that we also provide.” The group went on to discuss the structure and impact of Trust Groups, and the need for building community and accountability in such a high-touch support business. To help put it in perspective–it is truly a collaborative process, side-by-side, as loan officers work with their clients. Opportunity serves almost 1.5 million Trust Group clients through a staff of over 12,000, the majority of whom are local loan officers who are managing portfolios of 200-350 clients.

“Meeting the dedicated Oak Brook staff who help end the cycle of poverty in underdeveloped countries all over the world was an honor and I look forward to seeing the great progress they’ll continue to make in the years to come.” -Rep. Roskam Rep. Roskam showed interest in learning more about Opportunity’s agricultural finance initiatives, which we offer in Ghana, Malawi and elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa. As Morgenstern told him, “It takes an organization with the breadth and expertise of Opportunity to work with farmers at every stage of the process.”

After Roskam’s visit to our US offices, he reflected on his time in Ghana. He said, “I saw firsthand in March how the microfinance services of Opportunity International is empowering families and businesses within Ghana. Meeting the dedicated Oak Brook staff who help end the cycle of poverty in underdeveloped countries all over the world was an honor and I look forward to seeing the great progress they’ll continue to make in the years to come.”

For more on Roskam’s recent visit to Ghana, click here. For more on Opportunity’s work in that country, including our education finance initiatives and our work with the IDP Rising Schools Program, our agriculture finance program, our partnership with the Millennium Villages Project (MVP), and more, read the Opportunity Blog.

Innovation is at the heart of microfinance. It’s also the engine that propels it. Innovation is packed with chance, risk, fun, adventure! And, when coupled with microfinance, it helps bring opportunities to the people who need it most.