Wokai
Encyclopedia
Wokai is an organization that allows people to contribute directly to microfinance
Microfinance
Microfinance is the provision of financial services to low-income clients or solidarity lending groups including consumers and the self-employed, who traditionally lack access to banking and related services....

 institutions in China, which in turn lend the money to entrepreneurs in rural China. It is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization
Non-profit organization
Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

 based in Oakland, with core operations in Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

, supported by individual donors, corporate sponsors, fundraising events and grants.

History

Wokai was founded in March 2007 by Casey Wilson and Courtney McColgan after they met studying at Tsinghua University in Beijing. As of November 2010, Wokai has a leadership team of 5, a Board of Directors and an Investment Committee in addition to its 16 chapters of volunteer representatives in Beijing, Boston, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Nanjing, New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Shanghai, Toronto and Washington, D.C., London, Singapore, Bristol, Dallas and Atlanta (with upcoming chapters in Brussels, Chicago, Kunming, Taipei and Vancouver). Wokai also maintains a fellowship program called "Wokai Fellows", which allows selected individuals to work directly with one of Wokai's field partners in rural China. Wokai has raised almost $380,000 in loan capital through over 6,800 contributions from 55 countries in order to distribute 504 loans.

Found on the company website, features updates from the field through Wokai Fellows, profiles of Wokai volunteers from around the world, personal glimpses of rural Chinese life, and commentary about current developments in rural China and the microfinance sector.

Activities

Wokai allows accredited microfinance
Microfinance
Microfinance is the provision of financial services to low-income clients or solidarity lending groups including consumers and the self-employed, who traditionally lack access to banking and related services....

 institutions in China, called "Field Partners", to post profiles of qualified local entrepreneur
Entrepreneur
An entrepreneur is an owner or manager of a business enterprise who makes money through risk and initiative.The term was originally a loanword from French and was first defined by the Irish-French economist Richard Cantillon. Entrepreneur in English is a term applied to a person who is willing to...

s on its website. Wokai currently has two Field Partners, the Association for Rural Development of Yilong County (ARDY), which is based in Sichuan, and Chifeng Zhaowuda Women's Sustainable Development Association (CZWSDA), in Chifeng, Inner Mongolia. Lenders browse and choose an entrepreneur they wish to fund. Wokai aggregates loan capital from individual lenders and transfers it to the appropriate Field Partners to disburse to the entrepreneur chosen by the lender. The average loan is around $300 and is used by low-income entrpreneurs to invest in simple business improvements such as adding additional livestock or buying new products for dry goods stores. As the entrepreneurs repay their loans, the Field Partners remit funds back to Wokai and the lender is alerted of this repayment. Once the loan is repaid, the Wokai lenders can redistribute it to another entrepreneur, up to a total of three loan cycles.

Donors' funds are transferred to Wokai through Google Checkout
Google Checkout
Google Checkout is an online payment processing service provided by Google aimed at simplifying the process of paying for online purchases. Users store their credit or debit card and shipping information in their Google Account, so that they can purchase at participating stores by clicking an...

. Wokai's Field Partners charge between 15% and 20% interest rates. Field Partners use the interest from borrower loans to cover staff salaries, transportation, and operating costs.

See also

  • Microcredit
    Microcredit
    Microcredit is the extension of very small loans to those in poverty designed to spur entrepreneurship. These individuals lack collateral, steady employment and a verifiable credit history and therefore cannot meet even the most minimal qualifications to gain access to traditional credit...

  • Social entrepreneurship
    Social entrepreneurship
    Social entrepreneurship is the work of social entrepreneurs. A social entrepreneur recognizes a social problem and uses entrepreneurial principles to organize, create and manage a venture to achieve social change . While a business entrepreneur typically measures performance in profit and return, a...

  • Kiva (organization)
    Kiva (organization)
    Kiva Microfunds is an organization that allows people to lend money via the Internet to microfinance institutions in developing countries around the world and in the United States, which in turn lend the money to small businesses and students...


External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK