Small loans could help millions of poor women create jobs, support their families and narrow the gender gap, according to the United Nations and banking experts. According to International Labour Organisation (ILO) data released on 7 March, 2008, there are now 1.2 billion women working around the world, some 200 million more than a decade ago. Susan Maybud of the ILO's bureau for gender equality said that micro-financing -- small loans given to the poor, generally at slightly elevated interest rates--could play an important role in empowering women with no other economic lifeline. She also said to Reuters, 'Micro-finance is really their one glimmer of hope, their one way out of poverty'.

In Bangladesh, there is substantial empirical evidence from existing micro-finance institutions like BRAC, Grameen Bank and ASA as well as other NGOs with new programmes and instruments that they can effectively finance and refinance the micro as well as the small enterprise sector. It should be possible to quickly adapt the microcredit model to meet the financing needs of the fast growing SMEs. Most of the large NGOs in Bangladesh have had a similar experience and demonstrated their capacity to grow on a very fast track, but were constrained by availability of funds. We have some evidence of how fast the new enterprises can grow from the experience of ASA, Grameen Bank, BRAC,

some of the other NGOs as well as the emerging new private enterprises themselves. Here is a success story of a women microentrepreneur who became rich by running the nursery business within a very short time. Khaleda Begum, wife of Md. Mahbub Bahadur at Chittagang Road area in Shiddirganj Thana under Narayanganj District, was once an unemployed poor woman but she turned herself into a model to others when she earned a lot by selling deferent kinds of plants from her well established nursery project.

This is an example that others can follow.

Md. Mahbubur Rahman Bulbul

Dhaka