Kiva conducts regular, ongoing monitoring of all Lending Partners, but only posts status updates here in response to relevant, major changes at the partner.

Status update — September 1, 2021

Fundación Mujer's final loans with Kiva have been defaulted, and this partnership is now closed. For the last 5 years, Kiva has been working with Fundación Mujer to try to recover the remaining outstanding amounts due to Kiva lenders. Kiva and Fundación Mujer agreed upon a payment plan in June 2016, but Kiva only received $84,561 of a total of $189,446 of payment commitments made in this plan. Kiva’s present assessment is that this Lending Partner is unable to make further payments, and thus the remaining $104,885 in outstanding amounts due to Kiva lenders has been defaulted. Fundación Mujer continues to manage grant-funded programs, but no longer operates a microlending program. This means that they are not generating any revenue that could be used to repay Kiva.

If Kiva is able to recover any additional funds from Fundación Mujer, they will be applied to lenders' accounts on a pro-rata basis.

Status update — February 5, 2018

Kiva has contracted the services of an external debt collection agency to help retrieve lenders’ outstanding balance with Fundacion Mujer. This agency has made contact with the partner and we will provide more details on this page as we know more about the likelihood of recovery of funds.

 Status update — July 11, 2017

Fundacion Mujer hasn’t honored its agreement to pay back its outstanding balance to Kiva in a timely manner. While Kiva continues to be in touch with this organization, Fundacion Mujer is experiencing serious liquidity constraints. Given the lack of repayment, Kiva has decided to move this partner from inactive to paused status. Kiva will continue to work to recover the amount owed to lenders, and will settle out funds as they’re received.

Status update — June 14, 2016

Due to unexpected liquidity issues, Fundación Mujer has been unable to repay their full balance on time. As a result, this partner and Kiva have come to an agreed upon payment plan where will pay its full outstanding balance over the next 12 months. Kiva will settle out funds to lenders as soon as payments come in. 

Status update — December 1, 2015

Kiva has moved Fundacion Mujer to inactive status. This means Fundacion Mujer is no longer fundraising loans on Kiva, though Kiva fully expects the partner to continue to send repayments owed to Kiva lenders for as long as the partner has an outstanding balance. Should this partner request to resume fundraising in the future, Kiva will first conduct any additional monitoring and due diligence tasks we believe necessary.

Partner description:

Fundación Mujer is an organization specializing in the financial and personal development of female entrepreneurs in Costa Rica. They seek to reach underserved populations that include indigenous communities, immigrants, refugees, victims of domestic violence or women living with HIV/AIDS.

A unique lending approach:

Fundación Mujer seeks to empower women by preparing them for the current demands of the market, building confidence in their abilities and decision making skills, and to create a network and community of female entrepreneurs supporting one another as they grow.

The organization does this through 3 different types of loans. The Banco Mujer and Solidaria Mujer loans are both group loans, in which the group members serve as one another’s backers to obtain the loan and ensure that repayments are made on time. Individual loans are given to women with at least 6 months of experience working in a particular field or women who have owned a small business for at least 1 year. Additionally, Fundación Mujer offers courses in both business and personal development, as well as training in concrete skills such as sewing and other crafts.

Update from Kiva Staff on August 10, 2011

Fundacion Mujer has $17,446 in loans on Kiva currently in arrears out of a total outstanding portfolio of $90,500. As a result, its delinquency rate as expressed on the Kiva website is currently 19.28%.

As indicated by this delinquency rate, a number of Fundacion Mujer borrowers have struggled to make full payment on their original repayment schedules. Fundacion Mujer shared that a significant number of these struggling borrowers have been chili farmers affected by a downturn in chili prices. Another cause of delinquency, described in a series of Kiva journals posted earlier this year, was a bird plague that affected the crops of some farmers.

In order to better support these borrowers and also to increase the odds of successful repayment, Fundacion Mujer has been working with some of these borrowers in order to restructure their repayment schedules. To date, 22% of Fundacion Mujer's Kiva loans have been restructured. From data provided by Fundacion Mujer, the main reasons for restructuring appear to be: 1) production/sales problems (including agricultural production issues like chili prices and bird plague), 2) general economic difficulties, and 3) client health issues.

Almost half of Fundacion Mujer's restructured loans are actually repaying on time according to their new repayment schedules. Due to technical limitations, however, virtually all of the restructured loans appear delinquent on Kiva. This is because delinquency on Kiva is measured relative to the original repayment schedule as posted on the website at the time of the original loan. As such, the previously reported delinquency rate does not adequately capture the true repayment behavior of Fundacion Mujer clients on their new, restructured repayment schedules.

Kiva will continue to work with Fundacion Mujer to monitor client repayments on their Kiva loans, both restructured and otherwise. We will keep this page updated with further updates as information becomes available.

Want to learn more about Fundación Mujer? Here's how:

1. Join the "Friends of Fundación Mujer" lending team to get updates from Kiva Fellows and MFI Staff in Costa Rica here
2. Make a loan to a Fundación Mujer client on Kiva today here