Giving Till It Helps

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• Aim your gift at those with the least means, to whom small amounts make a huge difference.
• Give at least $200. That's enough to make a real impact on the poorest recipients and to allow them to address their dreams of tomorrow. If you give less than that, the money can help only with immediate needs. For ways to leverage a smaller donation, see 'Giving Circles.'
• Ask yourself if the gift will be able to expand.
• Make sure that the agency that facilitates your donation sends the funds directly to individuals. The more steps between your donation and the recipient, the less impact it will have.

The following organizations take three different approaches to enabling philanthropy:

Heifer International: For 50 years, the Heifer Project has been providing families in developing countries (and in areas of the United States) with breeding pairs of animals: cows, goats, pigs, rabbits, ducks, and so on. When a family receives a breeding pair they get meat, milk, or eggs, but more importantly, they get a source of income: They can sell the offspring. Each recipient must agree to give one breeding pair of offspring away to another family, thus paying the gift forward.

Opportunity International: The payback rate on tiny loans to workers in developing countries is greater than the payback rate on large loans to their home countries. In other words, from an outright profit perspective, you are better off loaning money to a Bolivian peasant than to the Bolivian government. Several nonprofits have pioneered microcredit loans on a large scale and for large investors. For a helpful citizen, though, it's easy to contribute funds to a wide variety of microloan programs through Opportunity International. This organization works through Trust Banks, groups of 20 to 30 (mostly female) borrowers who meet weekly to cross-guarantee the loans.

Trickle Up: Rather than dispensing loans, Trickle Up issues outright grants as seed capital for micro-enterprise hopefuls. The organization makes grants (typically $200) to those looking to open small businesses, like food stalls or repair shops, on the condition that grantees undergo basic business training, commit a minimum of 250 hours in the first three months to their venture, reinvest at least 20 percent back into it, and keep an account ledger. Follow-up expansion grants are offered, too.

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