LAHORE – The condition of over 26 districts in Punjab is extremely poor where up to 40 percent of the people are living below the poverty line. With a view to end impoverishment and destitution of the majority of the people, about 35 organisations are providing microfinance services to around 2.1 million people in the country revealed Asasah Chief Executive Tabindah Jafari. In a presentation to the Lahore Economic Journalists Association (LEJA), she said that microfinance includes several kinds of facilities including micro credit, savings, life insurance as well as health insurance.
“According to the new concept of the microfinance, customers need both financial and non financial services that are tailor made to suit their requirements. These services include a multitude of targeted credit products with appropriate loan sizes, savings, insurance, enterprise training and market linkages,” said Ms Jafari.
The target market of the microfinance organisations has continued to be those poor people who have no access to formal sources of credit, she stressed. It was noted that they have targeted the productive poor, primarily women to whom microfinance is providing empowerment as a key goal.
She said that the microfinance crediting was started in 1862 in Germany where small farmers were provided small loans for first time in the history. Aga Khan Rural Support Fund was the first of this kind of work in the country, established in 1982. While specialised microfinance institutions started their work from 1996 with the establishment of Khushhali Bank- the first microfinance bank in Pakistan.
