Microsavings Could Mean Big Gains for the World’s Poor

17 November 2011

This is the VOA Special English Economics Report.

When it comes to

savings, no amount is too small. Microsaving is a growing part of the international movement of

microfinance

. The aim is to bring financial services to poor people.

Modern microfinance started with Nobel Prize-winning economist Muhammad Yunus in Bangladesh. In the nineteen seventies, he started small

loan

programs that would become the Grameen Bank. Currently, microcredit providers are in over one hundred countries.

Now, microfinance institutions are starting to offer other services, including savings plans.

Recently, the non-profit group Small Enterprise Education and Promotion held a conference in Washington. SEEP works with over one hundred twenty groups around the world in efforts to cut poverty. It does this by supporting small businesses.

The goal is help microfinance industry experts share ideas. One idea is called Financial Access at Birth, or FAB. It is designed to start each person with a financial citizenship at birth through a savings account connected to a bank

deposit

.

Rosita Najmi is FAB's program director.

ROSITA NAJMI: "FAB starts with financial inclusion, but it creates other opportunities of inclusion across other

sectors

of health or education and I think that's what the international development community needs and seeks at this time."