Leesa Shrader

Leesa is program director of the AgriFin Accelerate Program at Mercy Corps, which is a 6-year, $24 million program funded by the MasterCard Foundation to expand smallholder farmer access to technology-enabled financial and information services in East Africa. Ms. Shrader joins AgriFin from CGAP, where she served as the senior digital financial services expert for Asia. She has over 20 years global experience working in financial inclusion with leading banks, mobile network operators and institutions, such as CGAP, the World Bank, GiZ, KfW and Women’s World Banking.

By Leesa Shrader

Blog

Power of the Persona: Applied Product Innovation with Bank BTPN

This is the second of a two-part blog series presenting some of the key findings from CGAP’s Applied Product Innovation program with the Indonesian Bank BTPN.
Blog

Indonesia: Anatomy of a Successful Human-Centered Design Project

CGAP recently completed an Applied Product Innovation (API) project with Bank BTPN in Indonesia. The goal of such API projects is to develop new financial service offerings that are relevant to customers’ lives.
Blog

Killer Apps in China: Social Networks and Financial Inclusion

In China, financial services offered through social media have recently begun to take off, with interesting potential to expand financial inclusion.
Blog

China and Kenya: Different Models for Scaling Branchless Banking

In China, branchless banking initiatives are starting to reach scale, but the story has different foundations from other country success stories, such as Kenya.
Research

China: A New Paradigm in Branchless Banking

While many banked people already use mobile banking in China, the country also has the potential to emerge as an important success story for branchless banking and financial inclusion and potentially a new paradigm.