Africa Region Findings & Good Practice Infobriefs

415 items available

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https://hdl.handle.net/10986/9389

These briefs report on ongoing operational, economic, and sector work carried out by the World Bank and its member governments in the Africa Region.

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 29

Ghana - Financial Services for Women Entrepreneurs in the Informal Sector
(1999-06) World Bank
The Ghana Microfinance Institution (MFI) action research network brings together organizations interested in providing financial services to the poor in Ghana. With World Bank support, the network carried out this study which provides brief descriptions of the innovations that informal, semi-formal, and formal MFIs have developed in providing financial services to female entrepreneurs in Ghana. It also makes recommendations on how such services can be strengthened and improved.
Zambia's Credit Management Services : Micro-Credit Schemes for Women Enterpreneurs
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1999-05) Amuah, Alexander
Credit Management Services Limited (CMS) was established in 1992 as a subsidiary of Molver and Company, a Zambian accounting company. It provides lending services through four schemes. This Action Research best practice study focuses on micro-credit schemes for women entrepreneurs. CMS lends to members of existing women's clubs. The success of CMS is to a large extent attributable to its innovative approach to micro-credit delivery -- portfolio diversification, use of existing institutions, transparent MIS, and regular club meetings. The CMS management has learned these lessons: a) high potential for rural savings, b) close supervision improves performance; c) women are a lower credit risk; d) the value of strict contract enforcement; and e) critical minimum loan size.
Ethiopia - Two Microfinance Delivery Programs
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1999-04) Muntemba, Shimwaayi
Formal financial institutions in Ethiopia have traditionally focused on the accessible urban towns leaving rural areas, where the majority of the population resides, without access to financial services. Recognizing this problem, a number of development agencies such as Redd Barna and World Vision started to provide access to financial services to the poor in rural areas in the 1980s. They undertook income generation programs by forming saving and credit schemes. Credit to the rural poor was provided in the form of grants, and agricultural inputs. Women were the primary targets of these programs. This study summarizes the findings of action research conducted on microfinance institutions in Ethiopia, with focus on the performance of Redd Barna and on Irish Aid-supported program. Action research facilitates the exchange of information on innovations and experiences so that other micro-finance institutions may learn from each other's mistakes and replicate best practices. The extended study on which this article is based addresses their mode of operation, organization, legal framework, as well as the financial and non-financial services they offer. The focus in on one urban and two rural and savings and credit schemes.
Social Funds and Public Works and Employment Projects in Sub-Saharan Africa
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1999-02) Frigenti, L.; Harth, A.; Huque, R.
The note outlines the lessons learned after a decade of experience with social funds, public works, and employment operations in Sub-Saharan Africa, and illustrates that a variety of models, and institutional structures exist within this sample of operations. It also reflects that projects need to be designed according to country contexts, political realities, and geographical considerations.
Lessons from Africa's Social Funds, Public Works and Employment Projects
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1998-11) Frigenti, Laura; Harth, Alberto; Huque, Rumana
The note focuses on the review of "Local solutions to regional problems: the growth of social funds and public works, and employment projects in Sub-Saharan Africa", which compares, and draws lessons from the African experience. It highlights three social funds in Zambia, Eritrea and Angola, and three urban works projects in Senegal, Benin, and Mauritania, and provides stakeholder views: it reports high impact on employment, income, and local capacity building; improved coordination between service providers; weak consideration to the sustainability of micro-projects; and, participatory inadequacies, at the expense of long-term sustainability. The note implies the greatest challenge these operations face, is the reconciliation of short-term, and long-term goals, and, beneficiary participation, and ownership should be key to social funds project design, with appropriate technical standards in design, construction, and supervision for micro-projects sustainability.
Development of Micro, Small Enterprises and Rural Finance in Sub-Saharan Africa : The World Bank's Strategy
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1998-03) Steel, William F.; Riley, Thyra A.
African governments place high priority on developing their indigenous private sector to participate in and lead future growth. This goal is constrained, in part, by the absence of a diversified financial sector capable of meeting the full range of the private sector's legitimate demand for financial services, especially among small and informal businesses. A related and equally pressing issue is the ability of the self-employed and rural poor to sustain the economic activities essential to their survival. Internationally, a variety of financial institutions have found ways to make lending to the poor sustainable and profitable and to take advantage of the lesson that even the poor self-employed repay their loans and seek savings opportunities. The challenge in Africa is to build capacity in the financial sector drawing on the lessons learned from international best-practice institutions. This strategy is an integral part of the Africa Region Finance Strategy. The principal pillars of the Finance Strategy are an initial focus on achieving a healthy fundamental policy and regulatory environment and concentration on building sound institutions through human resource and systems development. These themes are reflected in this strategy statement, whose chief objective is to support deepening and diversification of financial markets to serve the broad spectrum of entrepreneurs found in African countries, including the self-employed poor.
Rural Development, Poverty Reduction and Environmental Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1997-08) Cleaver, Kevin
? This article outlines the role that the World Bank will play in supporting a modified rural development strategy for the Sub-Saharan Africa region: The Bank will be more selective in targeting countries for assistance in rural development programs, focusing on those that demonstrate commitment to appropriate agricultural policy and investment. It will expand its information, education and communication initiatives to help governments generate widespread commitment by their citizenry. Bank finance will increasingly be directed towards national sector or subsector programs. Through country assistance strategies, the bank would ensure that national education, health, nutrition, transport, water and economic policy programs provide support for rural and agricultural development. Natural resource management, forestry, and water projects will be evaluated to identify best practice, leading to proposals for replication. All ongoing and proposed Bank-assisted agriculture projects will be reviewed to identify changes that would enhance the positive impact on using and developing African capacity. A participatory preparation and implementation plan involving farmers will be developed for every agriculture project supported by the Bank. Safety nets for the rural and urban poorest would be established. The Bank and its affiliates would more actively support the worldwide liberalization of agricultural trade and discourage inefficient industrial country agricultural policies.
Bank Restructuring in Sub-Saharan Africa : Lessons Learned
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 1997-06) Deschamps, Jean-Jacques; Bonnardeaux, James
A review of bank restructuring operations in seven countries of Sub-Saharan Africa - Benin, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Mozambique indicates that not all these efforts have succeeded. Interventions to break-up or privatize dominant state-owned banks are, in some cases, still going on, years after initial actions were agreed upon with local authorities. Hence, the importance of drawing lessons from these experiences for other African countries undertaking similar efforts. The review represents the first systematic attempt by the World Bank to analyze and compare the outcomes of bank restructuring programs in individual countries in the region.
Institutional Environment Assessment in Sao Tome and Principe
(Washington, DC, 1997-04) World Bank
The Institutional Environment Assessment (IEA) carried out in Sao Tome e Principe in October-November 1996, sought to assist the government in identifying the root causes of the country's poor economic performance and in formulating strategies to address them. It was a self-diagnostic exercise based on the active participation of local stakeholders so as to foster ownership of the follow-up reforms. It entailed comprehensive data collection and analysis through field reviews (by three working groups focusing on technical, administrative, and structural problems respectively); desk reviews of relevant consultant reports and economic and sector work; and a survey of governance and indigenous institutions impacting on economic management. A 4-day assessment workshop was held to synthesize, analyze and prioritize the information gathered, and to map out future strategy. Follow-up workshops are being held to formulate an implementation plan and apportion responsibilities between implementing agencies. Lessons learned: the IEA is an appropriate instrument for identifying the major institutional causes of economic underperformance; and the involvement of all the key stakeholders was a positive and strategic move. In many cases, it will be these stakeholders who will ensure follow-up on measures agreed, thus making government more accountable.
Informal Financial Markets and Financial Intermediation in Four African Countries
(1997-01) Aryeetey, Ernest; Hettige, Hemamala; Nissanke, Machiko; Steel, William
A study of both informal and formal financial markets in Ghana, Malawi, Nigeria and Tanzania, Financial Market Fragmentation and Reform in Sub-Saharan Africa, shows that informal institutions use specialized methods to serve broad segments of the population that lack access to banks. Although they have responded positively in a liberalized environment, fragmentation into isolated market segments persists. Greater efforts are needed to integrate informal institutions into financial development strategies. The study investigated structural problems such as imperfect information and costly contract enforcement and institutional weaknesses in banking systems and the legal framework that cause wide differences across lenders in the costs of screening, monitoring and enforcing loans. Poor information systems in low-income countries raise the cost to formal institutions of acquiring information on any but the largest clients. In contrast, informal agents utilize personal relationships, social sanctions and various collateral substitutes to serve market segments that remain beyond the reach of formal banks.