Response to Mr Alamgir Khan's article

We are writing in response to Mr Alamgir Khan's article “The other side of microfinance”. In it he queried what the sources of our literature review on the impact of micro-finance were. We sourced our evidence from published research on micro-finance in Bangladesh, using material from researchers based in Bangladesh and those abroad. Since the list of references is too long to reproduce in a letter of this nature, we would like to point to two papers which provide the details of each of the points made in our article along with their exact citations. These two overview papers are Khandker, S. (2005). “Microfinance and Poverty: Evidence Using Panel Data from Bangladesh.” World Bank Economic Review 19(2) and Zaman, H (2004) “The scaling up of micro-finance in Bangladesh: determinants, impact and lessons” World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3398. We hope readers find these papers helpful in assessing the impact of micro-credit on the poor.