Making Effective Use of Grants and Technical Assistance to Support Financial Institutions: Lessons for Funders and Implementers
Webinar
Financial institutions in emerging economies require multi-dimensional support, both through investment capital and non-commercial instruments, such as grants and technical assistance, to innovate and sustainably scale products and services, to reach new and vulnerable clients, and to maximize their development impact. The unique nature of financial institutions – and the systemic role they play in economies – influences how technical assistance and grant projects should be designed and delivered effectively.
This webinar, hosted by CGAP in partnership with CDC Group, covered how to make these non-commercial instruments provided to financial institutions most effective. CDC Group commissioned Tandem to consolidate industry practice and develop guidance for funders and implementers. Their recently published research report "Making the most effective use of grants and technical assistance to support financial institutions” served as the basis for discussion.
At the end of the webinar, participants will:
- Better understand the opportunities to effectively use technical assistance and grants to facilitate inclusive and sustainable business practice change within financial institutions at scale;
- Learn about the trends of using technical assistance and grants among donors and DFIs, and broader impact investors and understand emerging best practices and lessons learned; and
- Exchange with industry peers on opportunities and challenges of technical assistance and grants implementation in support of financial inclusion.
Henry Gonzalez, Lead Financial Sector Specialist at CGAP will introduce and moderate the discussion. Joanna Ledgerwood, Consultant and co-author of the CDC report, will summarize the report’s key findings highlighting lessons on what makes technical assistance and grants to financial institutions most effective. A discussion will then follow with Machal Karim, Development Impact Executive at CDC Group, sharing how these findings could impact financial institution investments and technical assistance strategies; while Victoria White, Managing Director, Global Advisory Solutions at Accion and Daryl Collins, Consultant & Senior Advisor, will react to the findings of the study and will share their deep expertise in technical assistance. There will be a Q&A session with the audience to end the webinar.
Speakers
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Henry Gonzalez | Lead Financial Sector Specialist | CGAP In addition to his work at CGAP, Henry Gonzalez is an Associate Fellow at Oxford University building on his experience across finance, emerging markets, impact investing and political and economic development. Previously, he served as the Head of Research & Advisory at responsAbility Investments AG and oversaw its thought leadership, technical assistance and ESG/impact investing integration strategies. |
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Joanna Ledgerwood | Consultant & Author Joanna Ledgerwood is an international consultant and author of numerous papers and books, including Transforming MFIs with Victoria White (2006) and the New Microfinance Handbook (2016), both published by the World Bank. In her previous roles, she was the founding Director of Financial Sector Deepening Zambia and she spent six years leading the Access to Finance activities for the Aga Khan Foundation from Geneva. In her earlier careers, she served as Deputy Director in Uganda and in the Philippines on USAID-funded projects focused on increasing access to financial services. |
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Machal Karim | Development Impact Executive | CDC Group Machal Karim joined CDC in 2017. She is a development impact specialist across CDC's investments in financial services in developing countries. She has previously worked for Leapfrog Investments, Oxford Policy Management and the MasterCard Foundation. She is currently also a Director for the Financial Inclusion Forum for the UK. |
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Victoria White | Managing Director, Global Advisory Solutions | Accion Victoria White has worked with Accion since 2001. She serves as a member of the senior management team and holds responsibility for overseeing Accion’s advisory support to its partners. Victoria is a co-author of a number of publications including Transforming Microfinance Institutions: Providing Full Financial Services to the Poor and Institutional Metamorphosis: Transformation of Microfinance NGOs into Regulated Financial Institutions. |
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Daryl Collins | Consultant & Senior Advisor Daryl Collins is author of the acclaimed Portfolios of the Poor and a pioneer working at the intersection of finance and human vulnerability. She spent the last decade as Managing Director and CEO of BFA. She is currently conducting work on a wide breadth of projects from data empowerment, to measuring financial resilience during disasters such as COVID, to tracking child and forced labor in last mile supply chains. |