beijing2008.jpgWith the spotlight on China with the 2008 Olympics Games, I naturally started to look at how China is doing in the microfinance sector.   However, to my surprise, there was actually very little information about microfinance in China.  I scoured the internet for hours, and could only find a handful of sites that had anything relevant.  So, I thought I would highlight some of my findings:

I was expecting there to be a lot more, but I was only able to find the following MFIs in China:

  • ARDPAS – Association for Rural Development of Poor Areas in Sichuan
  • CFPA – China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation
  • CZWSDA – Chifeng Zhaowuda Women’s Sustainable Development Association
  • OI China – Opportunity International China
  • PATRA Hunchun
  • PATRA Yanbian

Most of the articles I found were fairly old, so I here is a list of some of the more recent articles:

-Wokai
Wokai is a “capital-contributing microfinance intermediary in the China microfinance field.” They have good information on the site, and they have a great blog that talks a lot about microfinance in China.  Definitely a great place to start if you are looking for info about China.
-Mix Market
“The MIX MARKET â„¢ provides information to sector actors and the public at large on microfinance institutions (MFIs) worldwide, public and private funds that invest in microfinance, MFI networks, raters/external evaluators, advisory firms, and governmental and regulatory agencies.”  The Mix Market is very useful if you want to dig deeper into specific organizations and countries.
-China Asociation of Microfinance (CAM)
Although the website is a little hard to navigate, CAM has a lot of current events and news feeds about microfinance associations in China.

Like I said earlier, I wasn’t able to find very much information pertaining to microfinance in China.  If anybody has any other good websites with relevant information, please let me know.

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