The World Bank gathered some sixty specialists in Paris at the beginning of 2009, to discuss the financial crisis. BNP Paribas, a keen observer of micro-finance, also attended.

The general impression of the meeting was that the clouds looming on the horizon for micro-finance are in no way comparable to the cataclysm now affecting high finance. In a situation in where big banks are surviving thanks only to massive state aid, micro-finance institutions are developing healthily.

The Asian crisis of 1997 demonstrated that how resilient the sector was, as micro-companies continued to prosper while corporate entities were unable to service their debt. The present crisis will not, however, leave them entirely unaffected.

• Firstly, liquid funds are becoming scarcer and more expensive because of the constraints on the commercial banks that finance the sector.

• Secondly, the high volatility of commodity prices is having a marked impact on the standard of living of micro-entrepreneurs.

• Lastly, the decline in the currencies of the emerging markets, sometimes by as much as 30%, is likely to have a notable effect on institutions that cannot or do not wish to cover their foreign exchange risk. The growth in micro-finance, which not long ago was of some 40% a year, is likely to slow down to a more modest figure like 10% to 20%.

The crisis therefore does not call for a reappraisal of the economic and social value of micro-credit. On the contrary, while some four billion people are living on less than $ 2 a day and 20% to 50% more people worldwide will soon find themselves out of work. Micro-finance, which enables the unemployed to form their own company, may be one way of emerging from the crisis.