Co-founder of microlending Web site Kiva.org to speak April 14

Co-founder of microlending Web site Kiva.org to speak April 14

FROM RICE NEWS STAFF REPORTS

Jessica Jackley, co-founder and director of Kiva.org, the world’s first person-to-person microlending Web site, will speak at Rice at 6 p.m. April 14 in McNair Hall’s Shell Auditorium.

	JESSICA JACKLEY

Jackley co-founded Kiva.org in 2005 with the mission of connecting people through lending and the Internet to alleviate poverty in developing countries. For as little as $25, Internet users can provide affordable capital to help entrepreneurs around the globe start or expand their small businesses.

Since Kiva’s launch, loans totaling more than $67 million have been made in more than 40 countries with a repayment rate of almost 98 percent. By 2010, Kiva will have facilitated loans totaling $100 million.

Jackley has spoken widely on microfinance and social entrepreneurship and has seen microfinance at work in a variety of communities in more than 30 countries. She serves on a number of nonprofit boards and has worked in the Stanford Center for Social Innovation to launch the inaugural Global Philanthropy Forum.

The lecture is free and open to the public.

The Undergraduate Technology Showcase and a reception will be held in McNair Hall’s Anderson Commons after the talk.

The event is sponsored by the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management, the Beyond Traditional Borders Initiative and Rice 360