The Women's and Gender Studies Program hosted a conference to discuss microfinance and its effects on communities at the "Microfinance: Does It Work?" panel discussion that took place in the Heller School for Social Policy and Management Thursday evening. Microfinance refers to the involvement of non-governmental organizations or corporations such as Americans for Community Cooperation in Other Nations International and Oxfam America that provide small amounts of capital to individuals seeking to develop their own profit-generating businesses in small, developing countries.

Microfinance, specifically microsavings, targets these groups to give them the opportunity to rebuild their communities and households and to establish self-sustaining financial programs.

Panelists from ACCION International, a worldwide microlending firm; Oxfam America, an international relief and development organization; WORTH, a women's empowerment program which has been launched in 10 countries in Africa and Asia; and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy of Tufts University came together to discuss the effects of microfinance and microlending on developing communites and how to properly implement the two programs.

In an interview with the Justice, Roy Jacobowitz, managing director of external affairs for ACCION International, described microfinance as "providing a broad range of financial services at a reasonable price, in a convenient manner, with dignity for the clients, all over the world."

Jacobowitz noted that the financial services provided include various kinds of credit, savings, access to insurance and convenient payment systems.

It is "essentially the broad range of services that any household needs in order to manage its risk and accumulate assets."

In an interview with the Justice, Mei-Mei Akwai Ellerman, event coordinator and a resident scholar at the Women's Studies Research center, described why she felt it was appropriate to hold such an event at this time.

"It's so timely because, from a historical point of view, we are now facing such global issues-issues of poverty, issues of climate change. Issues that are affecting those who are already the poorest people in the world," she said.

Each panelist however, noted that microfinance is not a "panacea" for the issue of poverty. Ellerman said, "We have to find other systems, but in the meantime by true microfinance and true microsavings, we are affecting hundreds and hundreds of thousands of poor."

In an interview with the Justice after the event, Alex Patch '14 said, "I definitely found the information to be very informative. I never thought about the extent [to which] loans are crucial for many people in their daily lives."

In an interview with the Justice shortly after the event, Pamela Kimkung (GRAD), a student in the Heller School's Sustainable International Development program, said, "Although microfinance, in whatever form, is a very good idea and can go a long way in improving households, and to a large extent communities, there are specific contexts in which its practicability may be challenged.