UNCDF’s last mile financing models support digital finance innovations to reach unbanked, poor and remote populations who have been excluded from traditional financial networks. Programmes funded under this window also recognize that financial intermediation can be the missing link between adapted technologies and household access.

This work is founded on supply and demand diagnostics that support governments to engage stakeholders in creating roadmaps for financial inclusion. These processes bring to the table Financial Service Providers (FSPs), insurance companies, mobile network operators, technology companies, agricultural suppliers, and remittance companies, as well as regulators, policymakers (such as ministries of telecommunications, agriculture, education, social welfare) and civil society actors like consumer associations and financial education providers. Challenge funds support the development of new prototypes, and bring to scale viable business models that serve low-income consumers, medium, small and micro-enterprises (MSMEs), the un- and under - banked, especially women.

What projects is the Financial Inclusion and Innovation Window funding and where?

Making Access to Financial Services Possible (MAP) — http://map.uncdf.org

PRESENT IN: Botswana, Cote d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Lao PDR, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Myanmar, Mozambique, Nepal, Swaziland and Thailand.
Plan of Expansion in Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Togo and Viet Nam

Mobile Money for the Poor (MM4P) — www.uncdf.org/mm4p

PRESENT IN: Benin, Lao PDR, Liberia, Malawi, Nepal, Senegal, Uganda and Zambia
Plan of Expansion in Burkina Faso and Myanmar

MicroLead — www.uncdf.org/microlead

PRESENT IN: Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Ghana, Liberia, Malawi, Myanmar, Rwanda, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda.
Plans of expansion in Niger, Mali, Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Togo, Mozambique, Democratic Republic of Congo and Ethiopia