Antonique Koning

Senior Financial Sector Specialist

Antonique Koning leads CGAP’s work on Women’s Economic Empowerment through financial inclusion. She has more than 25 years of experience working on inclusive finance and has expertise in gender norms affecting women’s financial inclusion and empowerment, young women’s financial inclusion, responsible finance and customer centricity. Antonique is co-author of Addressing Gender Norms to Increase Financial Inclusion: Designing for Impact and chairs the Technical Advisory Committee of FinEquity, the community of practice convened by CGAP on women’s economic empowerment through financial inclusion. Antonique also led CGAP’s work on customer outcomes-based approaches to consumer protection, and is a contributor to CGAP’s Customer Centric Guide

Before joining CGAP in 2004, Antonique gained hands-on experience developing and implementing microcredit programs in El Salvador and working with savings banks globally. She has a Master’s degree in International Trade Management and Policy from the University of Birmingham, and a Master’s degree in Applied Economics from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. Antonique is based in Belgium, and speaks Spanish, French, and Dutch.

By Antonique Koning

Research

Responsible Finance: Putting Principles to Work

This paper defines what we mean by responsible finance, both as an end-state vision and in terms of a pragmatic focus on client protection and social performance management.
Research

Implementing the Client Protection Principles

This second edition reflects the developments in implementation and practices of the Client Protection Principles into investors’ policies and processes over the past year.
Blog

Postal Savings Banks Reinvigorated by Increased Competition

Postal banks in South Africa and Kenya are celebrating their 100th anniversary. But the environment has changed dramatically with the advent of mobile money and increased interest from commercial players in the unbanked market.
Blog

Getting Back to Governance

A lack of good corporate governance lies at the heart of some of the recent failures in microfinance.
Blog

Truth in Advertising

How far do microfinance funds expect their investments to go in changing lives? Are microfinance funds looking for specific changes in the lives of poor people or increased access to finance in a responsible way? And can we tell from the information they provide?