Recently, I happened to stumble on a site called:                                                                                            

Now, I’m here to promote this fantastic cause of microfinancing - the provision of small loans to people in developing countries who would not be able to secure finance any other way.

The costs to you are small, and it is not even a donation: you loan money, interest free - so you get it back. Now, this might seem a bit uncharitable, but as the saying from the Bible says, ‘give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for life’.

Let’s think about this. International aid to developing countries has increased year on year - since I’ve been alive, there must have been somewhere in the measure of trillions of pounds worth of benefits given over. You see the adverts saying that $1 buys food for a day, $10 buys shelter… something clearly isn’t working here.

I don’t think anyone wants to admit it, but Western governments love putting out how they have given X billions of pounds as aid - no-one is able to verify this - and very cheekily, debt cancellation counts as part of this ‘aid’; therby reducing the amount. And from there, it is also the sad case that the people most in need of it, do not get it.

In the bigger picture - people need education, not handouts. I am not sure that the US would agree with that - they would prefer to have that sense of superiority and control.

Anyway, next time you’re stopped in the street by one of those charity collectors, mention this site. Mention the fact that they are getting paid £7/h to canvas people - money which comes out of your donation - a totally false economy.