The Microfinance Information Exchange (MIX), a not-for-profit private company which provides financial and social performance information on microfinance institutions (MFIs), market facilitators, donor organizations and investors in microfinance, has attempted to answer the question, “How Many MFIs and Clients Are There?” with a recently published dataset.
The dataset reveals a total of 2,207 MFIs representing approximately 77 million borrowers in 100 countries. Most MFIs are concentrated in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Most borrowers are concentrated in South Asia, and the East Asia/Pacific region.
It is important to note that the dataset only includes MFIs that reported data voluntarily to the MIX and to the Microcredit Summit Campaign (MCS), a global initiative to propagate microfinance to 175 million people by 2015, as well as an inventory of MFIs from Latin America and the Caribbean prepared by the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), a multilateral finance institution committed to development of the Latin America/Caribbean region. The MIX indicates in the dataset’s disclaimer that the number of borrowers and MFIs reported be considered an accurate representation of the entire global figures because not all MFIs and clients are covered in the sample. Additionally, the sample omits many MFIs focusing on savings mobilization.
The dataset provides the following statistics for each of the 100 countries profiled:
- Total MFIs
- Total Borrowers
- Total Country Population
- Poverty Rates (Rural, Urban, National, $1 a day, $2 a day)
- Total Poor Population
- Penetration Rates (Total Borrowers/Population, Total Borrowers/Poor)
To download the complete dataset, visit http://www.themix.org/pub
-Steven Craig
Additional Resources:
IADB: http://www.iadb.org/
Microcredit Summit Campaign: http://www.microcreditsummit
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