Blog

Helping Smallholders Buy Inputs, One Scratch Card at a Time

What if there was a way to construct a digital finance product that was based on habits and behaviors that are already part of smallholders’ lives? There is: Meet the myAgro scratch card model.

Digitizing Agriculture Value Chains: Seasonal Cash Flows

Examining the cash flows of coffee and sugar farmers in Uganda for a CGAP-commissioned project revealed a seasonal cycle that is unsuited to monthly accounting practices. There are many ways that financial services could be designed to assist these farmers.

Lessons from Aggregator-Enabled Digital Payments in Uganda

To understand factors impacting aggregator profitability regarding digital bulk disbursements, we took a close look at a pilot in Uganda, where six USAID funded organizations tested digital payments to end recipients via payment aggregators.

Catalyzing Women’s Financial Inclusion: The Role of Data

For governments, the collection of sex-disaggregated data begins
 a virtuous cycle, where its availability informs stronger, evidence-based policymaking and helps regulators evaluate the effectiveness of policies intended to promote financial inclusion.

What Information Do Customers Need to Make Informed Decisions?

We know more today than every before about how customers use financial services. But we still don’t know enough about what information customers access about products they are considering, and how this informs their financial decisions.

Policy into Practice: Zambia Advances Women’s Financial Inclusion

What can stakeholders do to facilitate women’s access to finance? How can they ensure that women can participate in the economy without facing constraints and barriers limiting their success?

India's Regulator to do More on Inclusion and Innovation

Following a year of well-documented progress toward financial inclusion, the Reserve Bank of India took more steps in December 2015 that appear innovation-friendly.

Regional Trends in International Funding for Financial Inclusion

International funding for financial inclusion varies greatly across regions.

The Business of Aggregators: A Changing Market

Aggregators work in the background to help businesses, governments and donors easily connect with a variety of payment services. But how do aggregators get off the ground, what is their size and reach, and how does the business model work?

Instant, Automated, Remote: The Key Attributes of Digital Credit

Three attributes - instant, automated, and remote - underscore the power of digital credit and its ability to scale quickly.

The Graduation Approach Works: Now how do we Reach Scale?

Over half of 40 new Graduation projects are being implemented by governments. Some are adjusting the approach or integrating technology to make it more efficient and easier to scale.

Competition & Mobile Financial Services: Move Past "Test & Learn"

A country’s approach to policymaking in mobile financial services can have a big impact on the competitive landscape. A flexible, "test and learn" approach has helped foster innovation, but may begin to have adverse consequences for competition and consumer protection.

Aggregators: The Secret Sauce to Digital Financial Expansion

Aggregators are key players in the digital financial services ecosystem, but primarily operate in the background. What exactly is their role and why are they important?

Salam: Both a Greeting & Innovative Agricultural Financing Option

For over 6 million smallholder farmers in Pakistan, financing options are extremely limited. The Wasil Foundation, winner of the 2013 Islamic Microfinance Challenge, offers an alternative to traditional financing that enables farmers to build assets and sustainable livelihoods.

Digitizing Agriculture Value Chains: Building Value for Farmers

While there are clear benefits for buyers in digitized agricultural value chains, but the value proposition is less certain for farmers.

Towards a More Enabling Legal Framework for Microfinance in Iraq

Four Iraqi MFIs, representing 15% of the market closed their doors in recent years due to conflict in the country. This left 20,000 clients with few other options, as Iraq's financial system remains underdeveloped.

20 Years of Financial Inclusion in the Arab World

According to the Findex, the Arab World has the highest percentage of financially excluded adults. What are the regional obstacles? How has the field changed in the past 2 decades?

Top Five Takeaways from CGAP’s 2015 Funders Survey

The CGAP Funders Survey found that international funding for financial inclusion reached $31 billion in 2014.

5 Ways Digital Payments can Bring Women into the Economy

When women are locked out of the formal economy, development suffers and growth stagnates. Wiping out gender discrimination in financial access is not easy, but certainly incorporating more digital tools can help bridge the gap between men and women.

Digitizing Agriculture Value Chains: The Story So far

For the 7% of the world's smallholder farmers who work in tight value chains, digitizing the steps required to move an agricultural product from the farm to final customers could be an opportunity to deepen financial inclusion.