March 2010

Dear WWB Supporters and Friends,

March is an exciting month at Women’s World Banking, with plenty of programming and conferences to keep us all busy. As you may know, WWB has been a pioneer in the effort to bring together the formal financial and the microfinance sectors to spur the development of the microfinance industry and enhance efforts to provide basic financial services to millions of poor men and women around the world. On March 23 and 24, we will hold our 8th annual Microfinance and the Capital Markets Conference. This two-day event, sponsored by JP Morgan and held at their headquarters in New York City, will bring together investors and senior managers of microfinance institutions to build awareness of developments and investment opportunities in microfinance. After a challenging 2009, this year’s conference will focus on the opportunities ahead. To register for the conference, please click here.

On March 25th, we will host the WWB 2010 Global Dinner at Gotham Hall in New York City. We will be honoring Citi for its long-standing support of the microfinance sector in general and WWB in particular; and Pulitzer Prize winning author Sheryl WuDunn for giving a voice to ordinary women everywhere. We will also honor Alba Luz Bustos, a microfinance client of our network partner WWB Colombia. It promises to be an exciting evening. For ticket information and to learn more about the dinner, please click here.

I am pleased to announce the appointment of Kathryn Mayer as director of the WWB Center for Microfinance Leadership, which was created to deliver executive education programs and workshops focused on cultivating principled, visionary leaders in microfinance. Kathryn has more than 20 years of global private sector leadership development experience. She started her tenure on March 1, the same day the Center kicked off its weeklong “Advanced Leadership” workshop at The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. The workshop, designed for men and women leaders chosen from the top 200 microfinance institutions, will help participants enhance their knowledge, skills, and leadership capabilities in a complex and dynamic microfinance industry. The course is part of WWB’s overarching commitment to develop the leadership and management capacity of the microfinance industry worldwide. To read press coverage about Kathryn’s appointment, please click here.

I am honored to speak at multiple events this month. On March 3, I keynoted the annual UN Luncheon, sponsored by the US National Committee for UNIFEM Metro NY Chapter, which brought together leaders of women’s organizations who were attending the 54th Commission on the Status of Women at the UN. Together we celebrated the 35th anniversary of the First World Conference on Women, during which the idea of WWB was conceived.

On March 5, I will keynote the Seventh Annual Conference in Leadership & Ethics at NYU, which will focus on new challenges in microfinance. This is a special honor for me as Citi Foundation has been an important partner for WWB since 1999 and I am the 2009-2010 NYU Stern’s Distinguished Citi Fellow in Leadership in Ethics. The program is a ground-breaking effort designed to enhance research, case development and knowledge dissemination in the field of business ethics. This year it is dedicated to microfinance.

WWB has had some exciting media coverage recently. Earlier this year we gave our first loan guarantee in Asia to support a $1.6 million loan by Standard Chartered Bank Philippines to WWB network member CARD Bank. The loan guarantee, which was leveraged more than three times, is WWB’s latest effort to promote the responsible entry of commercial capital into the microfinance sector. To read press coverage about this milestone, please click here. Our increasing emphasis on savings as a means for poor households to build their asset base is highlighted in a recent BBC news article. And finally, WWB Trustee Marilou van Golstein Brouwers is quoted in a Wall Street Journal article that examines how commercialization might lead to mission drift for microfinance institutions, an issue that is of great concern to WWB.

As I mentioned, an action packed month indeed. We hope you will join us at the Capital Markets Conference and the Global Dinner, and show your active support for the economic empowerment of women around the globe.

Warm Regards,
Mary Ellen Iskenderian