ABSTRACT
In this chapter, designed to offer some observations on micro-credit practice, the author will use highlights of my own experience to illustrate the evolution of the sector. The purpose of the rural industrialization strategy was to improve employment opportunities for local people and increase their incomes in order to reduce poverty. Important early subsector research was undertaken during this period by my colleague, Steve Hagglade, who was the Senior Rural Industrial Officer. From 1986 to 1996 the author worked for an organization called Calmeadow based in Toronto. In 1986, Calmeadow was busy learning everything it could about micro-credit practice by informally apprenticing itself to ACCION International and co-sponsoring micro-projects in Latin America. The Coady International Institute was created in 1959 to extend the message and practice of community-based cooperation worldwide. Looking back, the past twenty years have been an exciting period of action-based research in the micro-finance sector.
