"[Microfinance] is recognition that poor people are the solution, not the problem. It is a way to build on their ideas, energy, and vision. It is a way to grow productive enterprises, and so allow communities to prosper." -- U.N Secretary General Kofi Annan
The efforts of First Step Initiative are based on a model called microfinance, an economic development technique that extends small loans to individuals to establish or expand a small self-sustaining business.
 Even though microfinance loans consist of small amounts of money, typically less than $200, that is ample enough to purchase inventory, supplies and tools to start or expand an income generating activity. It is also effective. Experience shows that microfinance is among the most powerful of instruments for self-empowerment.
To date microfinance has lifted millions many from the streets of destitution to the road of self-sustainability. Scores of microfinance initiatives have been focused in Latin America and Southeast Asia, with repayment rates at about 97 percent.
 Less robust are opportunities in Africa, with studies indicating that at the end of 2005 only seven million people on the continent had access to microcredit, creating huge demand and high potential.
In awarding the 2006 Nobel Peace Price to the founders of microfinance (Mohammed Yunus and Grameen Bank), the Norwegian Nobel Committee added this reflection: "Lasting peace can not be achieved unless large population groups find ways in which to break out of poverty."
In that sense the opportunity to support First Step initiative has an even greater impact. It empowers each one of us to create not just the destiny for others, but our own destiny as well. The road to self-sustainability leads to our future - and it is we who will pave the path there.
In this photo (right), Professor Mohammad Yunus meets with his customers at Kalampur village in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Jan. 21, 2004.
(AP Photo/Pavel Rahman)
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