Jeffrey Ashe

 Fellow at Carsey School of Public Policy, University of New Hampshire. Research Fellow at Global Development and the Environment, Tufts University. Adjunct Associate Professor at Columbia University

jeffaashe@gmail.com

As Oxfam America’s Director of Community Finance Jeff Ashe led the Saving for Change Initiative. Saving Change grew to 703,000 village women organized into savings groups in Mali, Senegal, Cambodia, El Salvador, and Guatemala. Prior to his work at Oxfam, he founded and led Working Capital honored by President Clinton at the White House. While serving as Acción International’s Senior Associate Director, he directed the first worldwide study of microfinance, introduced group lending to Acción, and helped spread this model worldwide. He has consulted on microfinance projects in more than 30 countries. 

Jeff is co-chair of the Grassroots Finance Action Team that researches and tests innovative approaches for ending extreme poverty. He and his students recently completed a study on group saving in immigrant communities.  (https://mangotree.org/Resource/How-to-Achieve-the-American-Dream-on-an-Immigrants-Income). He is currently exploring how the strongest organizers of informal savings circles in poor countries can be encouraged to train better groups, and how remittances can be better channeled to promote local development. 

Jeff teaches “Finance for the World’s Poorest” at Columbia University. His book, “In Their Own Hands: How Savings Groups are Revolutionizing Development” has been well received.