For an early client, a Rs 4,000 loan felt daunting. Her foundation now lends to nearly a million women.

Ms. Roshaneh Zafar founded Kashf Foundation in the mid-1990s as Pakistan’s first specialised microfinance institution. In its 30th-anniversary year it served 926,566 active clients. This month Kashf and Canada closed a ten-year partnership that, by Kashf’s count, reached more than 1.6 million people.