UNCDF and The MasterCard Foundation began partnering in 2010 and since then have worked together on important programmes in Financial Inclusion in Africa, YouthStart, MicroLead and the Mobile Money for the Poor (MM4P) programme.

#UNCDFExpertsChat spoke to Ann Miles, Director of Financial Inclusion of The MasterCard Foundation. Ann is a seasoned leader with many years of experience in financial services. She began her career in banking and spent 18 years with Citibank in the trade, financial institutions and private banking groups. During her time within the Private Bank Group at Citibank she was responsible for a large number of non-profit clients, including several microfinance network organizations. From Citibank, Ann was recruited to Women’s World Banking to head the financial products and services team that served microfinance institutions within the network. She joined BlueOrchard Finance in 2005 and led the development of several microfinance investment funds, including a major fund for Latin America. Ann received her Bachelor of Arts from Drew University. Ann serves on the Executive Committee of the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP) and the Board of Directors of Solutions for Youth Employment (S4YE).

#UNCDFExpertsChat: Seven years ago UNCDF and The MasterCard Foundation had the first conversation about financial inclusion. Seven years on, how has the landscape changed?

Ann Miles: The global momentum for financial inclusion has grown significantly in these past seven years. At the IMF/World Bank spring meetings in 2015, several key actors, including the World Bank itself, committed to achieve financial access for one billion people who are currently unbanked by 2020. As well, 193 member countries at the UN General Assembly that year endorsed the Sustainable Development Goals, with financial inclusion being incorporated into many of those goals. In addition, it’s now commonly accepted that financial inclusion can reinforce other important development interventions such as access to clean water, energy, and education.

#UNCDFExpertsChat: How has mobile changed this whole issue for The MasterCard Foundation?

Ann Miles: Globally, and in Africa in particular, we see examples of virtual banks that clients can access through mobile phones. As seen in the most recent GSMA report on the state of mobile money, there are 277 live mobile money services in 92 countries. There are 556 million registered mobile money accounts in 92 countries. Mobile financial services are available in 85% of countries where the number of people with an account at a financial institution is less than 20%. I think it’s fair to say that financial inclusion will be achieved largely through digital means.

At The MasterCard Foundation we will support those models and approaches which employ digital technology to expand access to financial products and services for those that are underserved or not served at all. Importantly, we will track usage so that we have a better understanding of which products and services are most relevant and affordable to clients and do no harm. We will also support fintech companies which are innovating in new products, analytics, and distribution to advance financial inclusion.

#UNCDFExpertsChat: Partnerships are key to implementing the new Sustainable Development Agenda. Which ones have been crucial for the work of The MasterCard Foundation?

Ann Miles: I would say that they all have been important to us. We are very grateful to the partners who have worked with us over the past 10 years since our founding. Since we are a relatively new Foundation, we have relied on partners to work with us in a collaborative way to develop programmes which help us to achieve our strategy.

We work with a range of partners including multilateral and bilateral agencies, international and local NGOs, and the private sector. Increasingly we will look to local African partners to advance our work.

In the future, we will identify partners who can help us achieve a systems-based approach to our work. This means that we will first explore the gaps in a country where we may work to see where our interventions can be leveraged or where those interventions might serve to complement the work of others.

#UNCDFExpertsChat: What lessons has The MasterCard Foundation learned from its interventions and achievements over the past 10 years?

Ann Miles: The past 10 years have been critical to where we are today. Our programmes have positively impacted the lives of almost 21 million people in 34 African countries. We’ve learned, however, that our impact could be even greater if we were to take more of a country-focused approach and if we explored ways to integrate our programming in financial inclusion, education, and youth livelihoods to address a critical challenge in Africa: youth unemployment.

Higher levels of financial inclusion will be an important means for helping young people and their families to pay for education. It will also help micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises to become more productive, thereby creating more opportunities for youth employment.

#UNCDFExpertsChat: How much progress have we made towards ‘getting rid’ of financial inclusion, or no longer needing it? What are the next steps that need to happen to realize that goal?

Ann Miles: I don’t think we’ll ever ‘get rid’ of the need to improve financial inclusion. Even if we achieve full universal financial access for one billion people by 2020 (this is only 2 ½ years from today!) there will be more to do. We need to ensure that financial inclusion is equitable and responsible and that vulnerable groups, including youth and women among others, are also financially included. In Sub-Saharan Africa, we need to do much more to close the gap (per Global Findex 2014, on average only 34% of adults in the region had an account). Some 350 million of the world’s two billion unbanked adults are in Sub-Sharan Africa.

I am encouraged by the progress of digital financial inclusion and the opportunity it presents to achieving greater financial inclusion in Sub-Saharan Africa. All the trends are positive, including the level of mobile money account ownership and the opportunities for digitizing payments. There is a lot of innovation and this, combined with lower pricing for smartphones and improving regulatory environments, will help speed financial inclusion. We are optimistic that Sub-Saharan Africa, with its large youth demographic, will leverage these developments so that financial inclusion is available to all, sooner rather than later.