[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 6 (Wednesday, February 4, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H301]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        IN SUPPORT OF HMO REFORM

  (Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I, too, rise to support the 
patient bill of rights and reform of HMOs because I believe it will 
help create a better health care system in this country.
  Today as well I rise to support another project supported so strongly 
by our First Lady Hillary Clinton, and that is to commemorate the one-
year anniversary of the Microcredit Summit, an international conference 
held here in Washington last year. The summit launched a campaign to 
provide 100 million of the world's poorest families with credit for 
self-employment and other businesses and financial services by the year 
2005. This, in fact, was not a handout but a hand up. This House passed 
that Microcredit for Self-reliance Act last year to assist in that 
endeavor.
  Microenterprises are very small, informally organized businesses, 
other than those that grow crops. Microenterprises often employ only 
one person, the owner-operator, but in some lower-income countries 
microenterprises employ a third or more of the labor force. The 
microenterprise program is targeted at the poor, seeking to help then 
increase their income and assets, raise their skills and productivity, 
increase their pride and self-esteem. It helps mostly women.
  I am here to support this program and hope the Congress will continue 
to fund it and applaud the First Lady for her vision in helping the 
world improve their lives and conditions.
  Microcredit is particularly important because more than ninety 
percent of microcredit loans go to women, who are, along with children, 
hardest hit by poverty. The small loans enable women to open their own 
businesses and, ideally, increase their independence and status in 
male-dominated cultures.
  The positive effects of the microenterprise program cannot be 
minimalized. Access to microcredit helps to educate women. It raises 
their income level and, thus, that of their families. It has been well-
documented that education women have fewer children, have more time 
between births, and therefore, have fewer health problems and have 
healthier children.
  On this one-year anniversary of their convention, I commend the 
thousands of delegates who came together at the Microcredit Summit, 
dedicated to improving the lives of our world's poor. I applaud not 
only the significant work that has been done, but that that is yet to 
come. I join other Members of this body in encouraging expansion of the 
Microenterprise program, particularly throughout Africa. No segment of 
the world's unfortunately enormous, poverty-stricken population should 
be denied the incredible opportunities this program provides.

                          ____________________