50 Weeks of Opportunity

Breakout Session: Microinsurance: A Powerful Safety Net

Opportunity’s MicroEnsure, the world’s first microinsurance intermediary, provides protection against the many risks faced by those living in poverty. Today, more than 3.2 million clients can fall back on our crop, loan, health, life and property insurance products in times of hardship or disaster. Who’d have thought that getting up at 8 a.m. on a Saturday morning to listen to someone speak about microinsurance would have been so interesting? In this session, Richard Leftley talked about how…

Breakout Session: Innovating to Meet Community Needs

“The more you listen and respond… the way you increase your chances of success and long term benefit is dramatic,” stated Jim Frantz, chief transformation officer at Opportunity Colombia, speaking about the importance of having local input and ownership when implementing initiatives in impoverished communities. This breakout session highlighted just a few of the innovative solutions to fighting poverty that have been implemented in Nicaragua, Colombia, and Ghana. David Allman began the session…

Conference LiveBlog: Panel with David Simms, Promod Haque and Deborah Farrington

Saturday morning at the Opportunity International Conference opens with a panel featuring David Simms, Board Chair of Opportunity’s Global Microfinance Operations; Promod Haque, Managing Partner of Norwest Venture Partners (NVP); and Debby Farrington, founder and general partner of StarVest Partners, L.P. Highlights from the Session Discussion Questions: 1. With your philanthropy you have “invested” in Opportunity. What are your key criteria for selecting the organizations in which you invest?…

Conference LiveBlog: Jeffrey Spector, Chief of Staff at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

This Saturday morning plenary session continues with a presentation by Jeffrey Spector, Chief of Staff for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Highlights from Jeffrey Spector’s Presentation "Innovations are not only happening in labs or on computers. I’ll give two examples: A few years ago, I was tasked with scaling up Gates’s organizations. We made an assumption: informal services are harmful to people in poverty. But in fact, people in poverty lead fantastically complicated financial lives.…

Conference LiveBlog: Actress and Philanthropist Connie Nielsen

Actress Connie Nielsen spoke from the stage today at this morning’s plenary session at the Opportunity International Conference. Connie founded the Human Needs Project (HNP) and Road to Freedom Scholarships in the Kibera slums of Nairobi, Kenya. She spoke today about her work with HNP and the power of working with a community to implement sustainable solutions to poverty, creating development not aid. Highlights from Connie Nielsen’s Presentation I was in a film called Lost in Africa. The premise…

Conference LiveBlog: Geoffrey Thige, COO of Opportunity Kenya

Geoffrey Thige, the dynamic chief operating officer of Opportunity International Kenya, shares from the conference mainstage all about the work and progress Opportunity Kenya has made, utilizing solutions that include mobile phone banking, microinsurance, financial literacy training and more to help clients build a better life. Highlights from Geoff Thige In Kenya, we have 39 million people, yet only 4 million people have bank accounts. There would need to be 500,000 jobs created to accommdate all…

Breakout Session: From Silicon Valley to Sub-Saharan Africa: Innovations Shaping the World

Rob Meloche, Opportunity’s VP of marketing and communications, got the afternoon breakout session started by asking the members in the panel to place the conversation about innovation and technology in the context of the developing world. Each of the members in the panel contributed interesting reflections. Here are the highlights: Steven Levy, senior writer of Wired magazine and author of “In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives,” talked about the importance of getting…

Breakout Session: Fighting Poverty with Technology

“There is never an end to the opportunities that are brought by technology; we are excited about what those are.” That’s how Daryl Skoog, senior VP of technology, ended his own introduction, as each of the members of the panel discussion was introducing themselves to the audience. Harry Turner, the panel facilitator and CEO of Opportunity’s Global Microfinance Operations, then got the conversation going by asking the panelist to talk about the technologies that are being used in the field. Skoog…

Breakout Session: Developing the Next Generation of Microfinance Bankers

Breakout Session: Doing Business for the Greater Good

Social entrepreneurs are individuals who bring innovative solutions to the most challenging social issues, offering both ideas and capital in support of wide-scale change. In this breakout session, I got the opportunity to hear from young entrepreneurs whose visionary business models reflect not just the bottom line, but their philanthropic commitment as global citizens to sustainable development. Facilitator: Liesel Pritzker, Founder and Board chair, Young Ambassadors for Opportunity Panelists:Amanda…