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The Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation is a multi-business operator whose mission is to contribute to the fight against poverty by promoting financial inclusion and entrepreneurship with social impact.
The Foundation has four main activities and coordinates Solidarity bankers, Crédit Agricole Group’s skills volunteering programme.
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The Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation publishes its 2020 Integrated Report which traces the highlights and key figures of this year marked by the health and economic crisis linked to Covid-19. Thanks to close monitoring and collaboration with its partners and other players in the inclusive finance sector, the Foundation ended the year with solid results.
As of December 31, 2020, the Foundation followed an outstanding portfolio to €81.2 million in favour of 75 microfinance institutions and 12 social enterprises in 39 countries. Women entrepreneurship and the development of rural economies remain at the heart of the Foundation’s action: 73% of the 7.3 million beneficiaries of the institutions supported are women and 85% live in rural areas.
Since the beginning of the crisis, the Foundation has carried out surveys of the organisations supported to understand the impact of the crisis and better meet their needs[1]. The Foundation also initiated a global coordination with other actors around the key principles to protect microfinance institutions and their clients in the face of the crisis. To date, 30 donors, investors and platforms have signed the engagement of the Coalition.
Thanks to this permanent dialogue with its partners and peers, the Foundation has implemented several measures adapted to support the sector. It has thus granted rollovers to 29 partners, mainly microfinance institutions, for a total amount of €9.4 million. In 2020, the Foundation also supported the organisations through 93 technical assistance missions[2], on priority topics such as business continuity plans but also on issues such as digitisation which is essential for the resumption of their activities.
The Foundation was able to count on the support of its funders to strengthen its action in 2020. It obtained funding from Proparco, the European Investment Bank (EIB) and Crédit Agricole CIB to establish a Covid-19 envelope and support the economic recovery of its partners.
In 2020, the Foundation also worked alongside the Crédit Agricole Group. Via a new cooperation scheme with Crédit Agricole Romania, new funding granted thought the FIR –A CA’s microfinance fund–, and a skills volunteering programme called Solidarity Bankers, the Foundation and Crédit Agricole have stepped up their actions for financial inclusion of the most vulnerable populations. A mission that will remain a priority during 2021 which represents a year of recovery.
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Soukeyna Ndiaye Bâ has been a Director of the Foundation’s Board since its creation. Engaged in the promotion of women entrepreneurs for more than 20 years, she is also Executive Director of INAFI (International Network of Alternative Financial Institutions) a global network of organisations that support microfinance programmes. Abdul Hai Khan is a Foundation’s Director and the Managing Director of Grameen Trust. He is also Board member of diferent microfinance and social business organisations in Australia, Bangladesh, China, France, India, Kosovo, Italy, USA and Yemen.
1/ Directors of the Foundation, you are also both international experts and microfinance practitioners. Can you share with us your analysis of the crisis and more particularly on the territories that you know well?
Soukeyna Ndiaye Bâ: In Africa, the current toll is close to 100,000 deaths and more than 3.7 million people infected, but these figures do not reflect the reality in the continent because there is no mass screening due to a lack of resources. Because of restrictions and border closures to contain the pandemic, the economic crisis has not spared the African continent. In this context, small-scale entrepreneurs, smallholder farmers and informal sector workers are directly afected. On the front line: women, both in rural and urban areas, who are very active in the informal sector. In Senegal, for example, about 94% of women entrepreneurs operate in the informal sector. In rural areas, in addition to the gravity of the economic situation, the already alarming health precariousness and dificulty in accessing healthcare may worsen.
Abdul Hai Khan: Current death toll in Asia is approximately 417,000, while the number of infected cases stands at more than 26 million. Schools in East Asia and the Pacific have been completely closed for more than 25 million children for almost an entire year. Covid-19 has slowed growth in East Asia and the Pacific (EAP) as it has significantly reduced economic activity, including tourism and trade. Growth in the AEP region, excluding China, is forecast to slow to 1.3% in 2020 from 4.7% in 2019. Millions of households have been afected by the loss of jobs and income (including remittances), while they still have to cover basic expenses or service debt. Consequently, the percentage of poor people has increased.
2/ How do microfinance and social business mitigate the efects of the economic crisis?
AHK: By improving access to essential services, microfinance institutions and social businesses strengthen the resilience of low-income populations, including small-scale entrepreneurs from the formal and informal sectors and smallholder farmers. They are therefore essential to protect the most vulnerable populations, severely afected by the efects of the economic and health crisis during the Covid-19 pandemic. To cope with this pandemic, many microfinance institutions have innovated and increased their support to their clients. For example, they have restructured loans to better support the most afected clients and accelerated their digital transformation, by introducing or improving cashless transactions through mobile banking channels and by creating virtual branches.
3/ What is the outlook for the years to come?
AHK: The magnitude of the damage that Covid-19 pandemic has brought in the world is huge. However, it ofers us a unique opportunity to improve, or even redefine, our economic structures by relaying on social and environmental consciousness. We should not call it a ‘recovery’ programme but a ‘reconstruction’ programme. In this comprehensive reconstruction plan, social entrepreneurship can play an essential role, as it can be a lever to transform unemployed people into entrepreneurs. Financial inclusion can help economic recovery go hand in hand with social development.
SB: The world is threatened with recession and food and social crisis. Building the «after Covid» world must therefore be multi-sectoral and focused on innovation. We must learn from the problems encountered during this crisis: better assess and anticipate risks, strengthen our socio-economic models and rethink our public policies to better protect the most vulnerable populations. Women entrepreneurs will have a key role to play in boosting the economy. Supporting female entrepreneurship will be a lever for women empowerment and the development of rural and urban economies. Digital will be a major tool to encourage entrepreneurship, modernise, develop and innovate.
Following the official launch of the French Coalition of Foundations for the Climate on November 18, the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation signed, alongside 80 other organisations, the Manifesto of the new French Coalition of Foundations for the Climate (CFFC).
Launched by the Centre Français des Fondations and its partners, the Climate Coalition brings together foundations and endowment funds with a common goal: act together in the fight against climate change. The Coalition will promote the good practices of signatories, produce work on engagement of the philanthropic sector and mobilise human and financial resources to support initiatives to address the climate crisis.
Through funding to microfinance institutions and investments in enterprises located in rural areas, with a strong social and environmental impact, the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation is positioning itself as an actor that promotes the resilience of rural economies in the face of climate change.
With a portfolio of € 87 million as of March 2021, the Foundation mainly supports organisations that contribute to rural development in Africa, Asia and Europe. Thus, out of the 7.3 million beneficiaries of funded microfinance institutions, 85% live in rural areas. In addition, the Foundation supports, through technical assistance, enterprises that promote more sustainable agricultural practices.
With the signing of the Manifesto but also the membership of the French Centre for Funds and Foundations (CFF), the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation reaffirms the inclusion of the climate issue in its practices and strategy, and calls for other actors of the inclusive finance sector to commit to this global issue.
