Micro-credit is one of the big success stories in poverty reduction really. Bangladesh is probably the most famous example with the Grameen Bank, which has now grown. It's lending out about $7 billion in total now. Millions of borrowers have benefited, and longer-term studies show they actually cross the poverty line in something like 60% of the cases simply through borrowing for their own little businesses and the benefits flowing through to their families. The nice part, of course, about micro-credit is that in the end it's not charity. The Grameen Bank doesn't now take any donor money. Canada used to support it years ago, as it did other donors, but now it's just self-sustaining from the savings of its own borrowers.
On December 3rd, 2007. See this statement in context.