I'm using kiva.org and have deposited $9,000 over couple of years.
With auto-relend option my account circulated currently $58,325 through 2,268 loans (individuals or groups) in 61 countries.
For auto-relend I chose all countries except US, both genders. The sectors are Agriculture, Clothing, Education, Food, Health, Manufacturing, Retail. Have not chosen sectors Arts, Construction, Entertainment, Housing, Personal Use, Services, Transportation, Wholesale, as I do not feel these are basic enough.
If you're making more than a percent or two interest in what you believe is warm-fuzzy charitable lending, you're simply deluded. Almost all of these enjoy double digit interest rate yields... that's after losses for defaults. Most are around 30% some over 80%. It is very obviously a morally bankrupt practice which has managed to clothe itself as a charity.
I'm not disagreeing with you, and recall reading elsewhere about Kiva's deceptive practices, but could you back up that claim with some evidence, or at least a more detailed explanation?
This is why I've stopped believing in giving to on-the-door charity pleas, or give-some-money-to-X-before-you-check-your-goods-out-at-the-checkout. It seems much better to properly research one or a handful of organizations and give to those, than to give to organizations you have hardly heard of because of the immediate social pressure.
I used to donate through Kiva until I discovered that the whole "directing" story was just marketing. That doesn't make Kiva evil, but it does remove much of the feel-good motivation of supporting a named project.
I wonder if there are any public APIs for those "TSDB, TIDE, CLASS, KSTF, TECS, IBIS, TUSCAN, TACTICS" etc. databases. Would be interesting to look at the data.
What are the acronyms?
I'm of an European descent and I'm not talking on behalf of Japanese nation. Just my personal thoughts.
Japan (Tokyo) is my permanent home and I feel unease with all the economic developments of our immediate neighbor.
I'm more than happy that they could lift themselves up from poverty and I'll be happy if we could be good mutually respecting partners.
But I'm also quite concerned about my future in the next 10-15 years. Quick economic success can lead a nation to feel they are better than others. History tend to repeat itself.
Chinese don't have to start wars, they just need to keep (em)migrating. A peaceful conquest. Also by 2030 Tokyo/Japan will be a one big retirement centre, so you will have to enable more immigration (or finally come up with really good robots/rejuvenation pills).
And to make things worse, lets say Japan has a "collective karma" against China.. I dont know how this generation(post-war) handle this... and if its just buried in the past..
Also we got one more powerful actor into the club of bullies (together with US and Russia)...
If one of those 3 bullies clash with each other (and boy, they like a fight).. say farewell to our beloved peace..
I think you have nothing to worry about. Big powerful countries rarely fight each other because they both lose. China would always back down from a war because they have most to lose, unless they were facing direct invasion by outside forces.
Also nobody wants Siberia and I'm willing to bet the cost of annexing it and trying to revitalize it as some new economic zone would be a fruitless effort. I mean if Mongols didn't want it back then I'm sure nobody else wants it now
I wonder how they tackle the problem of monoculture.
The issue with biofuel from algae is that once the container is contaminated with fungae, it reqires expensive draining and bleaching.