An Exclusive Interview with Sam Daley-Harris Director, Microcredit Summit

Sam Daley-Harris Director , MCS

Mr. Sam Daley Harris  gave an exclusive interview to Mr. Jerome Peloquin , Microfinance Focus`s Managing Editor-US,  Here are the excerpts from the interview:

Mr. Peloquin:  The Africa-Middle East Regional Microcredit Summit will be held April 7-10, 2010 in Nairobi, Kenya.  That will be the 14th regional or global summit the Microcredit Summit Campaign has organized.  Tell us a little about how the Campaign started 15 years ago.

Sam Daley Harris:  In 1985 I graduated with a degree in Music from Miami.  I was a percussionist but my heart was turning in another direction.  In 1986 I went to Washington, DC and founded RESULTS to end poverty, a nonprofit corporation.  I had John Hatch from FINCA and Dr. Yunus on my board.   We tried to get the UN to adopt our 100 Million out of poverty goal, but were told they would take no new goals.  So, we decided to set our own goals and run our own conference.  In February of 1997 our conference drew 2900 attendees included Chief’s of State, Corporate Executives, and Social Activists from 137 countries.  In 2007 we passed that goal.

Mr. Peloquin:  You often talk about the importance of rule-breaking in microfinance and the field looses sight of the importance of rule-breakers.  Tell us more about that.

Sam Daley Harris:  … The rule breaking idea came from talking with Dr. Yunus 20 years ago.  If you hear his regular lecture on Microfinance you will hear parts of that conversation today.  The Grameen model of Microfinance was based upon breaking the rules… by violating traditional banking practice.  If traditional banks lent to the affluent he would lend to the poor.  I banks lent principally to men, he would lend mainly to women.  If banks asked for collateral before making a loan, he would ask for none.  If banks required people to come into a bank to get a loan, he would go to them to give out loans.

Now as microfinance is becoming a main stream banking system, we need to start thinking about breaking the rules of Microfinance.  When we were setting the conference sessions at the Latin America-Caribbean Regional Microcredit Summit  (June of 2009) we submitted 50 titles for selection.  The title that got the largest vote was, “Breaking the Rules of Microfinance to End Poverty.”

Mr. Peloquin – At the Latin America-Caribbean Regional Microcredit Summit in June of 2009 in Cartagena, Colombia, you spoke in your opening ceremony remarks about using microfinance for redemption. That doesn’t sound like standard microfinance fare. What was it you were getting at?

Sam Daley Harris –  It’s part of what I meant by breaking the rules.   Ingrid Munro of Jami Bora was funded to repair a market that had been destroyed during civil unrest.  Instead of looking for a construction company, she looked for the gang who destroyed the market in the first place.  Ms. Munro and her staff located the gang leader and through reason and empathy the gang leader and his entire gang were convinced to play a major role in reconstruction, a decision that changed the lives of the gang, bringing self respect and dignity.  That was an inspired rule-breaking move.  It resulted in a new market and a new start for the gang leader and his gang.  Is that not redemption?  In breaking the traditional rules, Ms Munro is using Microfinance as an instrument of both social and economic justice.

Mr. Peloquin – In August you’ll be in Bangladesh and India focused on one of the Campaign’s major goals, ensuring 100 million families rise about the US$1 a day threshold.  Tell us about the purpose of the trip and how it fits in to the goal.

Sam Daley Harris – We are convening an expert panel and launch a major demographic study.  We will have key senior managers from The Grameen Bank, BRAC, and ASHA convened.  Our intention is to determine how many families have been raised above the $1.00 per day poverty line in Bangladesh while clients of the Grameen Bank.  There is no intention of finding causality.  We know that would be an unrealistic goal.  We will simply determine how many made that critical step while clients of the Bank.

Mr. Peloquin – From your perspective, what’s the next big thing the Microcredit Summit Campaign can contribute to the field?

Same Daley Harris – We believe that Urban Slums are a real opportunity for Microfinance’s social outreach.  We’re going to select representatives of the top social mission MFI’s from Africa, Asia, and Latin America and bring 54 of them to participate in a ten day immersion course at Jami Bora so that they can bring social and economic justice, and redemption to the urban slims of these cities.

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An Introduction

Sam Daley-Harris is director of the Microcredit Summit Campaign. He is the founder of RESULTS, a grassroots lobbying organization that seeks to create the political will to end hunger and the worst aspects of poverty. He is also the founder of RESULTS Educational Fund, a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to mass educational strategies to generate the public will to end world hunger and the worst aspects of poverty.

Sam is currently leading phase II of the campaign to help boost the UN’s Millennium Development Goals for 2015 and includes two of its own new goals: 1) reaching 175 million of the world’s poorest and 2) ensuring that 100 million families rise out of $1 a day poverty, lifting half a billion people out of extreme poverty.

Mr. Daley-Harris is the esteemed recipient of the first Susan M. Davis Lifetime Achievement Award and is the author of the book Reclaiming Our Democracy: Healing the Break Between People and Government, about which President Jimmy Carter said, “[Daley-Harris] provides a road map for global involvement in planning a better future.” Mr. Daley-Harris has also edited two cutting-edge publications on microfinance: Pathways Out of Poverty: Innovations in Microfinance for the Poorest Families and More Pathways Out of Poverty.