Daniel Tam-Claiborne will spend his fellowship year working on a microfinance initiative with the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation (CFPA), the largest civil society organization of its kind on the mainland. Against the backdrop of China’s rapid economic growth, small-scale microfinance has been applied as a way to mitigate the increasingly widening income gap between the urban rich and the rural poor. CFPA has been a pioneer in the field, having benefitted over 1.2 million rural farmers in its 16-year existence, of which over 90% are women. Based in Beijing, Daniel will undertake fieldwork in rural townships to support the organization by measuring the impact of CFPA’s microloans on women farmers. These impact evaluations will incorporate both qualitative surveys and quantitative analysis to assess the degree to which microloans are supporting improved livelihoods across a matrix of key indicators. With a background in writing and a passion for storytelling, Daniel will also be drafting ethnographic pieces that provoke wider discourse on domestic poverty in China. By working directly with a local NGO to empower rural women, this initiative seeks to contribute to increased participation and further development of the fledgling microfinance sector in China. Prior to his graduate studies at Yale’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, Daniel spent two years working in the rural northern town of Taigu, China as a recipient of a Shansi Fellowship. Daniel is a graduate of Yale University (M.A.) and Oberlin College (B.A.).