European Microfinance Week 2014: Developing Better Markets
This report summarizes the discussions, viewpoints, and vitality of the European Microfinance Week 2014. European Microfinance Week is the annual event of the European Microfinance Platform (e-MFP), that gathers its diverse membership and other interested professionals from related sectors to debate, exchange, and share experiences on issues impacting microfinance in developing countries. The 2014 event brought together over 400 opinion-leaders, top management of banks, funds, and other financial institutions, practitioners, academics, NGOs, analysts, raters, and industry commentators from 56 countries to present key innovations, challenges, and also the work conducted in the previous year. It focused on the topic 'Developing Better Markets,' and included 31 workshops covering a wide range of topics. Some of the key topics discussed in these workshops include:
- Balancing financial inclusion, market stability, and client protection;
- Investing in microfinance as a channel for other impact finance themes;
- Microfinance and poverty;
- Microfinance in conflict zones;
- Investing in agricultural microfinance;
- Increasing youth economic opportunities through access to finance;
- Green microfinance, energy access, and non-energy products;
- Developing a standardized approach to risk management;
- Savings for the bottom of the pyramid with a focus on self-reliance and institutional outreach;
- Accelerating rural finance in Africa;
- Building green capacities in financial institutions.
