---

Don’t lose the mission Posted by: Salomón Raydán Presidente de Fundefir Venezuela

September 25, 2005

This seems to be a discussion space -for a long time needed, and I think that is important that it’s developed among very knowledgeable people from the social sector, given the quality or their insights. When reading some of the aforementioned opinions, it’s very difficult to support one or the other, possibly due to the fact that both make sense. I think that all of us agree that market-based approaches represent a great opportunity for the social sector and for this reason we need to take them into account. The question then becomes in how do we take this strategy forward without loosing the basic purpose/meaning of our core mission/work? With not doubt, it’s very important to considerate the microfinance example. The fact that we talk about a Microfinance Industry, that has grown during the past 20 years and served millions of people, indicates that the concern about accessibility to financial services by the poor, has been taken care of in a quite efficient way. On this path, however, several mistakes –operational and strategic, have been executed. When several international organizations saw the potential of microcredit and focused their approach on market strategies, they allocated their resources to professionalize the sector and make NGO’s self-sustainable. However, in this process, several NGOs lost their path and became commercial banks with their same practices and vices, which resulted in the lost of their missions and disengagement of their target population. Nevertheless, several other organizations did professionalize without losing their mission, developing quality products, and making financial services much more available to the poor. Now, 20 years later, we must present solutions that improve those models and transfer benefits from NGOs to the poor. That’s our mission at own capital Bankomunales. However, we recognize the importance that microfinance market-based approach has brought to millions of people and there are several successful cases that prove it. For this reason, we need to think about why and how to implement the market-based approach, and how to create partnerships with the business sector so our solutions can help millions of people. For this, we need to establish our clear mission as Social Entrepreneurs.