UN ADVISORS GROUP ON INCLUSIVE FINANCIAL SECTORS HOLDS FIRST MEETING TO SEEK SOLUTIONS TO POVERTY THROUGH IMPROVED ACCESS TO FINANCIAL SERVICES
Leading financial experts meet to improve access to sustainable financial services for the world’s poor
28 June 2006: UNITED NATIONS, New York - Leading financial experts will meet at the United Nations on 30 June for the first meeting of the United Nations Advisors Group on Inclusive Financial Sectors. The Advisors Group will provide advice and guidance to the United Nations and will seek ways to make a broad variety of financial services accessible for the poor and for small enterprises across the globe.
"Our challenge is to overcome the constraints that exclude people from full participation in the financial sector," said UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. "The great expertise of this new Advisors Group can help us find ways to broaden access to the financial services that small firms need to prosper, and that poor people need to improve their lives. Together, we must build inclusive financial sectors."
“To achieve the Millennium Development Goals to allow broad based growth and human development ” said UN Develoment Programme Administrator Kemal Derviş, “ financial sectors in many poor countries need to be developed and strengthened . People on low incomes and small enterprises need access to a broad range of financial products and services on a sustainable basis . This Advisors Group will help the UN to look at these issues in a systematic, concrete way and will devise new means of helping to eliminate the constraints that too often prevent people from accessing financial services and being able to work their way out of poverty. ”
“Fewer than two per cent of the world’s poor have access to financial services -- credit or savings -- from sources other than money lenders ,” said José Antonio Ocampo, United Nations Under Secretary General for Economic and Social Affairs. He added that “regulatory, supervisory and financial services infrastructure issues also limit access to financial services in many developing countries.” Ocampo said this new Advisors Group was established to make recommendations to the UN and other stakeholders in addressing access issues in each of these areas.
The Advisors Group comprises more than 20 global financial experts from governments, Central Banks, regulatory agencies, microfinance institutions, the private sector, civil society, development agencies, and academia . “ The Advisors Group was established to follow up on the initiatives undertaken last year under the International Year of Microcredit ,” said Richard Weingarten, Executive Secretary of the UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF). “It will, however, have a broader focus since it will deal with all the issues involved with inclusive finance. Its emphasis is to encourage, support and monitor global progress toward the establishment of inclusive financial sectors, particularly among the least developed countries. ”
The Advisors Group has been established for a two-year term, with the secretariat hosted by UNCDF in New York. Members of the Group include representatives of ABN AMRO Bank, Accion International, the African Development Bank, Bank Rakyat Indonesia, Deutsche Bank, Equity Bank of Kenya, Goldman Sachs, the Government Savings Bank of Thailand, the International Monetary Fund, the Microfinance Center for Central and Eastern Europe, the Netherlands, VISA International, the World Bank, the World Council of Credit Unions (WOCCU), and other organizations.
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A background paper and list of Advisors are available.
Contacts:
Adam Rogers
Head, Communications
United Nations Capital Development Fund
+1 212 906-6082
adam.rogers@uncdf.org
Hyewon Jung
Microfinance Programme Manager
United Nations Capital Development Fund
+1 212 906-6693
hyewon.jung@uncdf.org
