Financial Inclusion Week Round-Up – Day 2

> Posted by Center Staff

Janautthan Samudayic Laghubitta Bikash Bank Limited event in Nepal

This post is part of Financial Inclusion Week, a week of global conversation on advancing financial inclusion. This year’s theme is keeping clients first in a digital world. Throughout the week participants will share their thoughts in events and webinars, on social media, and through blog posts. Add your voice to the conversation using #FinclusionWeek.

It is day three of Financial Inclusion Week 2016 and while we are sad to be more than half-way through, we are so excited by the conversations that have already happened! Already, Financial Inclusion Week events have taken place in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Nepal, and Tanzania, among other locations.

Before we dive into a recap of the events that happened yesterday – we encourage you to take another look at the list of webinars happening during the rest of the week and register today to participate. Additionally, we encourage you to join the Twitter conversation with #FinclusionWeek. Starting today, CFI (@CFI_Accion) will be asking a number of questions to the Financial Inclusion Week community focused on the theme, keeping clients first in a digital world.

What’s Happening

In Luxembourg yesterday, the ADA held a panel discussion exploring keeping clients first in mobile banking and microfinance. The conversation was led by Laurent de la Vaissière, Director of the Information & Technology Risk Department at Deloitte and included Devyani Parameshwar, Lead Development Manager of M-PESA at Vodafone, and James Onyutta, Managing Director of Musoni Kenya. You can watch the full conversation below.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09z5f9Z2__s&w=560&h=315]

In the first of the Digital Frontiers Institute’s (DFI) Financial Inclusion Week webinars, DFI’s Ignacio Mas and Accion’s Kathleen Yaworsky addressed the subject of people’s financial coping mechanisms and how digital financial services (DFS) providers can better integrate behavioral insights into their product design and customer engagement strategies. Looking at key differences between the more affluent and those at the base of the pyramid, Ignacio identified four main motivations that should guide the industry: [moving] beyond convenience, beyond data, beyond our own money management attitudes, and beyond products. Kathleen highlighted the importance of the goals of financial inclusion, and suggested that DFS focus on more flexible product design and enhanced customer engagement in order to help create a sense of engagement with and ownership of these products for the many people who are accessing DFS for the first time. Kathleen also provided examples of DFS products that have successfully incorporated behaviorally-informed practices and other technologies (e.g., social media platforms) to help build users’ financial capability beyond traditional financial education [methods/techniques] and give them the tools that they need to navigate their own financial journeys.

In Nepal, Janautthan Samudayic Laghubitta Bikash Bank Limited held a seminar at Butwal-11, Rupandehi, Nepal to discuss the topic of financial literacy and the role of digital media. Over 80 clients, most of which female, joined the seminar and explored the role of digital media in building their financial literacy and capability.

In Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Harvard Kennedy School’s Business and Government PIC – Fintech Committee explored the role that fintech can play in reaching wider development goals, and identified the regions that are currently hotbeds for fintech innovation. David Porteous led the conversation and suggested that the next big thing in financial technology will hopefully be informed consumer voices coming forward in the ecosystem.

Online Conversation

UK Financial Inclusion Commission – Financial Inclusion Can Be Good for Financial Service Businesses as well as for People
In the second of the UK Financial Commission’s daily Financial Inclusion Week blog posts, Laurie Edmans, Financial Inclusion Commissioner, turns to the business case of financial inclusion.  Edmans argues that financial inclusion initiatives must be commercially viable to work and highlights two experiences in the UK where this has been the case: getting lower paid employees to have pensions savings, and expanding insurance access to those exposed to flooding.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation – Edu-Action: Financial Inclusion in Practice
The Foundation highlights how the field of behavioral economics can help us understand how and why people structure their financial lives the way they do. The post inspects the approaches and effectiveness of several behaviorally-inspired interventions, which represent a shift from basic classroom-style financial education. Previous blog posts from the Foundation that focus on financial inclusion also include JPMorgan Chase’s Dedication to Financial Inclusion and What Business Is Doing to Prepare Kids for Success in the Digital Economy.

For more, including the week’s full event list and a curated #FinclusionWeek social media feed, visit the Financial Inclusion Week website.

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