COVID-19 Financial Health Challenge

Improving people’s financial health is a key enabler for inclusive growth and to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), financial well-being is defined as “a state of being wherein you:

• Have control over day-to-day, month-to-month finances
• Have capacity to absorb a financial shock
• Are on track to meet your financial goals
• Have the financial freedom to make the choices that allow you to enjoy life.

UNCDF under its Financial Health work is proposing to launch the ‘COVID-19 Financial Health Challenge’ in partnership with Singapore FinTech Festival. The objective of the challenge is to raise awareness and inspire collective action toward improving the financial health of this new breed of workforce by crowdsourcing viable solutions from start-ups and MSMEs globally.

The challenge will be designed to:

1. As a test bed to pilot the solutions in the market, iterate quickly and gather insights over a couple months of intense bootcamp, field testing, mentoring and judging;a. Use Malaysia and/or China
2. Provide seed capital and technical assistance to a maximum of 3 promising solutions;
3. Provide opportunity to present at global stage – FinTech Festival.

The covid-19 pandemic has particularly brought this notion to the foreground. With billions of people around the globe confined to their homes due to the pandemic, many are experiencing job losses and reduced incomes. In such times, those that are financially resilient are less likely to be severely impacted than those that aren’t.

Are there (digital) products and services that could help individuals become more financially resilient and better prepared for adverse and unexpected financial futures? In other words, how could these solutions help people shore up their financial futures, so they are better prepared to weather income losses and/or unexpected emergency expenses? Is there a behavioural aspect we can explore in the way we design and deliver solutions so as to drive positive financial behaviours such as savings, asset-building and risk-mitigation?

We’re looking for solutions that can clearly articulate how a product or service can enhance an individual’s financial resilience. In doing so, the solution can invoke design thinking, behavioural sciences and other approaches that are not merely product focused. The solution could take the shape of a financial product, a delivery channel or a learning tool. An ideal solution is one that considers data-driven approaches to design and deployment, is user-friendly, has a measurement mechanism to monitor and track progress and deployable at scale in the future.

Structure of the Application:

• The application should follow the template provided in the online application form which is available at https://hackathon.apixplatform.com/financialhealthchallenge/landing
• Only applications that follow the format provided in the online application and include all the necessary documentation will be accepted.
• Applicants are requested to present their innovative ideas, business models and solutions and to provide evidence of their social and environmental impact.

Submission of the Application:

• Queries to this challenge can be submitted via email at finlab@uncdf.org no later the 26 June 2020 23:59 GMT. A list of Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) is provided on the challenge page at https://hackathon.apixplatform.com/financialhealthchallenge/landing.
• Applications will only be accepted online through the application page. In case there is a problem been faced by the participant on submission, they may reach out at finlab@uncdf.org.