...the UN has designated 2005 the International Year of Microcredit, in a push to promote access to finance for the poor as a way to reduce poverty...A big danger in the coming year is that policymakers will focus exclusively on macro, top-down solutions - debt relief, big infrastructure projects, trade liberalisation. Focusing as well on access to finance for all, may be the best way to ensure that these macro changes benefit the world's poor, not just the poor world's rich elites.