As industrial countries proceed down this path, in a sense they are following the job strategies of developing countries, rather than the other way around. Theindustrial countries are developing countries, rather than the other way around. The industrial countries are developing more of the small, micro and individual enterprise that have long formed the backbone of rural economies and poor nations - except that in the industrial countries, these small businesses are often consulting firms and independent contractors. As corporate mergers and consolidations shed traditional employees, much of the work they did is being done by these contractor or consultants.

These trends have been labelled "de-jobbing," and the process is proceeding at such a fast pace that many economists, management experts and futurists are now talking freely about the "end of the job", instead of possessing a "job".

Though microenterprises offer an opportunity to provide employment for groups of people not reached by large corporations, they are not suitable substitutes for all the functions performed by big companies. They cannot make big dams or heavy machine or construct bridges. Theydo not have the capital for large, long-term investments, so they usually can't exploit economies of scale.

On the other hand, it would be a mistake to continue regarding microenterprises as the poor cousins of the corporate world. For many tasks, small enterprises may be better suited, they have the inherent advantages of high flexibility, lack of bureaucracy and speed of decision making. Very small businesses may also find more success in certain cultural settings than big companies do.

In most countries, however, microenterprises have been neglected. They have not been rewarded with subsidies, tax reliefs and other benefits often received by big industries as political spoils, rarely can they afford to participate in financing political campaigns, lobbying for favourable legislations, or in some countries, establishing profitable relationship with corrupt regimes.

In developing countries, major flow of funding support has been historically oriented to large projects - hydroelectric dams, highways ,pipelines and mine. Only more recently has attention begun to shift to the development of "human capital" - the nurturing of educated and healthy people who can contribute to sustainable economic growth. But little attention has focussed on the kind of small-scale enterpreneurship that could help to give such people more opportunities to use their growing capabilities.

Even so, some analysts believe that it would be a mistake to shift public assistance toward microenterprises. They argue that without first investing adequately in electricity and roads, few businesses of any size will thrive. Such analysts also claim that the benefits to the society that come from human capital investments like education, are larger than those that will accrue from assistance to tiny companies, and that without growing investments in education, even microenterprises will suffer.

In an era when governments are financially strapped all over the globe, the prospect of securing much stronger public support for microenterprisesdevelopment might seem remote. But the big development banks decisions illustrate a unique quality of this kind of development that could give it a critical boost. Microenterprises have a strong potential appeal to both conservative and liberal politicians.

For liberals, there is the opportunity to help disenfranchised people - women and the poor - to thrive. There is the appeal to work in ways that give expression to their individuality, rather than as cogs in a large industrial machine. And perhaps most appealing, there is the thought that microenterprises give the worker a closer look at the meaning of his work.For conservatives, there is the opportunity for disenfranchised people to make their way out of poverty by virtue of hard work instead of charity. Development loans would produce better results if, instead of being directed to big corporates or the governments, they were straight to private small businesses.

Whatever their origin, the development banks' entry into finance for microenterprisescan be seen as a momentous endorsement - not of microenterprises as a substitute for infrastructure projects or for education or public health, but as an important complement to those needs. No longer stigmatised as a "backward" kind of business, to be rolled over by the juggernaut of large-scale modern development, microenterprises have the potential to be not only a very productive, up-to-date kind of business, but one that may well prove vital to the long-term sustainability of human economics.

There is an old Chinese saying: Many little things done in many little places by many little people will change the face of the world.

The author is a general manager with Oriental Bank of Commerce, New Delhi