This is the third in a series of brief ’spotlights’ of some of the less traditional charitable organizations out there. The aim? To highlight some of the fascinating - and fun - ways that it’s possible to help others in today’s web-based world. I’m focusing on those charities with a significant web presence, because they’re universally accessible, and particularly those that have a slightly different approach from sponsorship and the other typical methodologies. As you will see, some of the organizations out there are doing a tremendous job of introducing human interest and personality to the process of giving.

Trickle Up’s mission is ‘to help very poor people worldwide take the first steps out of poverty by providing conditional seed capital, business training, and support services essential to the launch or expansion of a microenterprise.’ To achieve this goal, Trickle Up partners with local agencies.

From the Trickle Up site (www.trickleup.org):

Trickle Up believes in people and their capacity to make a difference. We empower the world’s poorest people to develop their potential and strengthen their communities. We pursue this goal in a way that encourages innovation and leadership, maximizes resources, and promotes communication and cooperation among all Trickle Up constituencies.

Trickle down economics was a political selling point in 1979 and Glen and Mildred Robbins Leet weren’t buying it. Frustrated that huge sums of money allocated to top levels of society never reached the world’s poorest, the Leets decided to reverse the equation — from the bottom-up. In 1979, the Leets founded Trickle Up as an empowering response to global poverty.

Trickle Up outreach began when the founders traveled to one of the Caribbean’s poorest nations, Dominica. The Leets recognized what other poverty alleviation programs were missing: that even the world’s lowest income people have entrepreneurial potential. The model they created was simple, but effective.

With the assistance of local agencies and $1000 of their own money, Glen and Mildred gave ten people grants of $100 to launch their own microenterprises. The Leets provided them with Trickle Up business plans and reports to track business expenses and earnings. New business activities ranged from building blocks to selling eggs, jams, and school uniforms. Some of those businesses are still operating today! Results were overwhelmingly positive in terms of quality of life improvements for our entrepreneurs. Like this, the Trickle Up program was born.

Twenty-nine years later, Trickle Up is a critical vehicle for social and financial empowerment. Trickle Up has helped people start or expand over 150,000 businesses as a way out of poverty, affecting the lives of over half a million people.

As the mission statement suggests, Trickle Up helps poor people by providing business training, seed capital grants and support to help people launch a small business or microenterprise. They identify potential entrepreneurs with help from local organizations - they have more than 80 of these partners - and have field offices in India, Mali and Uganda to implement the programs.

Trickle Up’s website has a wonderful collection of entrepreneur profiles, but it’s not possible to donate to a specific person or project. Instead, donations may be made to ‘help entrepreneurs like this one’.

86 cents from every dollar donated goes to programs and services, and the remaining 14 cents is allocated to fundraising and administration.

For more details, visit the Trickle Up site.

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