PERSPECTIVE

*** *********** The End of Poverty:How We Can Make It Happen In Our Lifetime By: Jeffrey Sachs Penguin Press, 2005 xviii + 397 pages ***************** “Silent Tsunami” happens in our daily life. More than 20,000 people die everyday because of extreme poverty. Most people are unaware of the daily struggles for survival, and the vast numbers of impoverished people around the world who lose that struggle. They die namelessly, without public comment. Such stories rarely get written. Poverty is the greatest challenge of our age. More than one billion people live in the extreme poverty, it means one sixth of world population. Considering enormous problem, do we dare to dream a world free of poverty? Jeffrey Sachs bravely answers, yes we are. Not only dreaming, the Special Advisor to UN Secretary-General also gives concrete ways to reach the dream through his new book entitled The End of Poverty as a road map to a more prosperous and secure world. Sachs’s experience is globally recognized. Th...

The progress of microfinance in serving microenterprises in Indonesia remains low. Although the activity is backed up by some banks such as BRI (people’s bank) and BPR (rural bank), there is still a huge gap between demand and supply. Based on data of Gema PKM (The Indonesian Movement for Microfinance Development), not more than 10 millions of 41.8 millions microenterprises have been served by microfinance. It means less than 25% of the total microenterprises in Indonesia. In the global level, microfinance is now accepted as a strategic tool for poverty alleviation. It is not very surprising when the United Nations has named this year as International Year of Microcredit (microfinance). Actually, this event is related with the Millenium Development Goals, which has an ambitious target for reducing half of the poverty rate until 2015. As it has been accepted in Microcredit Summit 1997 in Washington, there are 4 principles for running microfinance institution. These principles are reachi...