Trek with Us this Thanksgiving Week Our Turkey Trek Virtual 10K starts today, and you can still join us! Grab your running shoes, swimsuit, skateboard, or whatever gets you moving and travel 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) or more between November 19-26th to complete the challenge. Registration remains open for the duration of the Trek, …
Social Entrepreneurship in Action: Part II of the Teysha Story
Teysha is so thrilled to launch our first collection of handcrafted products made exclusively for Whole Planet Foundation. 10% of sales of this collection will be donated to Whole Planet Foundation to fund even more microloans around the globe. I could not be prouder to bring this idea full-circle from …
Cash Shortages Create Problems in Zimbabwe
A few months ago, I visited WPF partner Thrive Zimbabwe with Daniel Zoltani, Whole Planet Foundation’s Global Director of Programs. We met many micro-entrepreneurs who had taken loans from Thrive for their small businesses. Some grew mushrooms to sell in the market and to stores. Others traveled to South Africa …
Whole Foods Market Suppliers are Alleviating Poverty Together
Join us in celebrating 13 years of poverty alleviation! In 2005, Whole Foods Market chose microcredit as the vehicle by which it would support global communities where the company sources products. A company-wide Global 5% Day on October 25th resulted in $525,000, which launched Whole Planet Foundation’s mission to fund …
125 Advocates Join the Poverty is Unnecessary Fund
The Poverty Is Unnecessary Project includes Poverty Is Unnecessary Fund members donating $25,000 each to alleviate global poverty, and the Poverty Is Unnecessary Benefit & Live Auction that will celebrate the impact of this work by Whole Planet Foundation and its supporters. This year’s generous Poverty Is Unnecessary Fund partners contributing $25,000 each are Alaffia, Cedar’s …
Fair Trade Safaris: Experience the Best of Africa while Making an Impact
This guest blog comes to us from Fair Trade Safaris, a new donor supporting our mission and Platinum Sponsor of this year’s Party with a Purpose Benefit in Austin, Texas. You can bid on a Fair Trade Safari package at this year’s event or online. Bid online from anywhere on …
Farming + Finance for a Path out of Poverty
At Whole Planet Foundation, we hold that microfinance is not a “silver bullet,” but an important component in a series of factors which can permanently lift people, families, and communities out of poverty. Additionally, because people near the base of the economic pyramid often rely on subsistence farming or basic …
Vital Farms: Making Lasting Change by Supporting Small Businesses
Back in 2007, when Matt and Catherine O’Hayer started pasture-raising hens, their thoughts were never just on the birds in their care, but in using whatever means at their disposal to effect lasting change. Directly, that meant challenging long-held assumptions in the food business – that sustainable could not mean …
Microfinance vs. Informal Finance: A Fair Comparison?
If microfinance is so effective, then why hasn’t the industry put informal moneylenders out of business? This is the question that a recent paper, Microfinance for poverty alleviation: Do transnational initiatives overlook fundamental questions of competition and intermediation? in Transnational Corporations and accompanying blog set out to find the answer …
KOMIDA’s Social Performance Management Journey
KOMIDA: Investing in a Future without Poverty in Indonesia As part of Whole Planet Foundation’s annual due diligence visits to our microfinance partners around the globe, we observe the presence or absence of “responsible finance indicators” which shed light on how our partners are serving the world’s poorest people. Many …