User:RC1999/Sandbox

Root Capital

Root Capital is a nonprofit social investment fund that provides capital, financial education, and market connections to small and growing businesses in Latin America and Africa. Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts the organization also has regional offices in Costa Rica, Guatemala, Kenya, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Peru.

Root Capital's mission is to pioneer finance for grassroots businesses that build sustainable livelihoods and transform rural communities in poor, environmentally vulnerable places.

Background

Root Capital was founded in 1999 by William Foote, who had previously worked at Lehman Brothers, and as a business journalism fellow with the Institute of Current World Affairs in Mexico. These experiences gave him insight into the challenges small-scale producers faced in obtaining affordable financing to grow their businesses.

Across the developing world, the absence of capital and the isolation from viable markets exclude the rural poor—approximately 75% of the 2.6 billion people living on less than $2 a day—from the formal economy. As a result, they make a subsistence living that exposes them to drought and disease, strains the natural environment, and limits opportunities for long-term economic development. Trapped in the “missing middle,” or the gap between microfinance and corporate banking, businesses such as farmer and artisan cooperatives in Latin America and Africa lack access to capital to expand their operations and generate economic opportunities for marginalized populations.