Tafir (EIB)
Leading a Consortium with the GIZ and Spark, Frankfurt School was awarded the Technical Assistance (TA) Programme to EIB’s Southern Neighbourhood Microfinance Facility. This programme supports the financial inclusion of vulnerable persons in the Southern Neighbourhood (SN) of the EU, a flagship EIB initiative to foster economic development in the MENA region and an impactful measure to increase the financial inclusion of the most vulnerable persons located in the region.
Aimed at youth, unemployed individuals, migrants and refugees, the TA programme complements EIB’s EUR 71.25 million Southern Neighbourhood Microfinance Facility (SNMF) that supports small microfinance investments in the MENA region. It will help to further sharpen the impact of the Facility in achieving its overall goals of sustaining job creation, socio-economic growth and contributing to poverty alleviation.
As lead partner in the Consortium, FS MENA continues to support financial intermediaries as well as small businesses with fewer than ten employees as final beneficiaries. Financial intermediaries interested in serving more vulnerable persons, in particular migrants and refugees, are assisted through market feasibility assessments, the design and launch of appropriate products and the improvement or fine-tuning of their products. PFIs can also benefit from lessons learned by other financial intermediaries with experience in the sector. In this regard, our experts are working on capacity building at partner institutions to improve their product offers, processes and procedures; deliver training and coaching to their staff; and to improve their MIS/IT infrastructure. Final beneficiaries will further benefit from vocational training to be delivered by the Consortium partner, addressing financial literacy, managerial capacity and entrepreneurial skills, such as business and financial planning.