PPI Blog

The Microfinance Information Exchange (MIX) has acted as a real champion for social performance in past years as a data warehouse for microfinance institutions. They have helped lead the industry effort to create a set of social indicators through the Social Performance Task Force and have just recently revised the list.

As the new Latin America and Caribbean PPI specialist for Grameen Foundation, I have just completed-- and helped facilitate-- my first Training of Trainers course in San Salvador, El Salvador. During the last few weeks, Mary Jo Kochendorfer and I have been preparing all the materials for the sessions while I learn as much as possible about the PPI.

During a recent visit with a microfinance partner in Senegal, a colleague and I encountered two of the most discussed issues related to the PPI: the kind of collection with associated advantages and disadvantages and the organization’s attitude toward cost. This blog is also available in French below the English copy, thanks to Absa Gueye, APSFD Senegal.

Last August, my colleague Babacar Sambe and I set out in earnest to plan Grameen Foundation’s first deployments of the Progress out of Poverty Index (PPI) in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). After analyzing the landscape, considering budget constraints and the location of local GF staff, we decided to begin our first efforts in Mali and Senegal. Rather than go it alone, we reached out to other international NGOs that support poverty-focused microfinance institutions (MFIs). And to round out our collaborative group, we invited other important locally based constituents-- namely a microfinance rating agency and the national associations of both countries. Our group of PPI supporters was formally branded the PPI Users Collaborative in Africa, otherwise known as PUCA (pronounced PUCK –a). PUCA includes Catholic Relief Services, Grameen Foundation, Oikocredit, Terrafina Microfinance, Planet Rating, and the national associations – APSFD Senegal and APSFD Mali.