http://www.microfinancefocus.com/news/2010/02/27/microfinance-new-helpline-during-natural-disasters/ An Initiative of Microfinance Focus (www.microfinancefocus.com) Wed, 08 Sep 2010 11:49:49 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc hourly 1 http://www.microfinancefocus.com/news/2010/02/27/microfinance-new-helpline-during-natural-disasters/comment-page-1/#comment-3241 Lauren Burnhill Sun, 28 Feb 2010 15:03:24 +0000 http://www.microfinancefocus.com/news/?p=3482#comment-3241 Most established areas of disaster relief (shelter, emergency medical, pubic safety etc) have organized "clusters" with designated coordinating organizations and action/response mechanisms. When these were defined, microfinance was, perhaps, less of a potential factor in recovery - but whatever the reason, our industry doesn't yet have a formal cluster. I am happy to say that CGAP, MIF and USAID have pulled together to bring coordination to the microfinance industry's response to the Haiti earthquake. Yesterday's quake in Chile suggests that perhaps we as an industry need to go further in organizing ourselves to respond to natural disasters! Most established areas of disaster relief (shelter, emergency medical, pubic safety etc) have organized “clusters” with designated coordinating organizations and action/response mechanisms. When these were defined, microfinance was, perhaps, less of a potential factor in recovery – but whatever the reason, our industry doesn’t yet have a formal cluster. I am happy to say that CGAP, MIF and USAID have pulled together to bring coordination to the microfinance industry’s response to the Haiti earthquake. Yesterday’s quake in Chile suggests that perhaps we as an industry need to go further in organizing ourselves to respond to natural disasters!

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