I have been a long time donor to Kiva, networking generous people with lenders to entrepreneurs of third world countries through their website. After receiving rewarding personal notes from the people you help, you get the feeling that your donations are going straight into their hands to help them with their business. You can monitor your donations being fully repaid in small increments, Kiva will then take the money that is repaid in form of credits, allowing you to re-lend your $25+ to new projects. Now, you can also donate a % of the funds to the Kiva administration for each loan your process. I have made over 9 loans in the past couple years, some of them repaid in full, some still owing money.

When you process a loan you also have the option to count each loan you make towards the overall impact of one of your teams, recently I’m supporting the TEDxOttawa Kiva Team, which has a goal to raise up to $1,500 in Kiva loans. I makes me happy to know that my minimal loans can make a difference in people’s lives.

Kiva has grown in the developer community as well, check out KivaPedia and Build.Kiva, they’re independent websites which aggregates Kiva’s lending data.