September 23, 2009

One or two good reasons for supporting The Green Children

As the old proverb goes, “Tell me whom you associate with, and I will tell you who you are.” That is also why I think The Green Children are worth encouraging and supporting. In fact, they work in association with 2006 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus, the father of microcredit, namely the extension of very small loans (microloans) to those in poverty—too poor to qualify for traditional bank loans—designed to spur entrepreneurship and by consequence to give those people the chance to bring themselves out of poverty.

Such financial innovation originated with the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, and was marked by considerable success. The Grameen Bank currently serves over 7 million families. As it was not enough, due to the success of microcredit, many in the mainstream finance industry have begun to realize that those microcredit borrowers should more correctly be categorized as pre-bankable. As a result a lot of traditional large finance organizations are now contemplating microcredit projects as a source of future growth.. An egg of Columbus!

Well, when Milla Sunde—who is one of my most cherished Facebook friends—and Tom Bevan established The Green Children Foundation what they exactly wanted to do was to support such a great idea. Because they “believe in promoting positive stories that highlight the solution, not the problem.” And I must say that I love their cause almost as much as their attitude of mind..

Milla is a professional singer and songwriter who from a young age, as she herself tells it on the Foundation’s website, hoped to channel her creativity “in a way that could positively influence the world.” Hence “Hear Me Now.” Enjoy this beautiful song (by the way, 50% of the iTunes proceeds will go to a new lending project for the poor of India), and please spread the word and help Milla and Tom raise awareness by sharing the video below.