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Topic 2 : Corporate responsibility : governance and financing of fair development

Workshop 2.3 : Financing business creation: access to credit for all

Complete file of the workshop _ English and french version

Workshops Topic 2 :

Access to credit is essential to growth and development for individuals and small and medium enterprises alike, whether this credit serves for funding professional advancement, setting up a company, investing in production facilities or creating jobs.

Currently available financing solutions and criteria, notably bank financing, only partially meet these needs. This situation results in a weak economic driving force and deteriorating social cohesion. Numerous initiatives have been implemented to develop financing for the populations that are excluded from the traditional system. These initiatives have proven their effectiveness, but the number of people benefiting from them remains limited. Facilitating access to credit for the greatest possible number of people is thus a major challenge in the economic and social development of local areas.

This workshop will look at various practices in order to define the pre-conditions for including this type of financing in traditional loan systems, especially in the banking system. It will also examine the factors for success of such financing and in particular at ways of assisting borrowers.

How can banks and financial institutions organise lending for underprivileged people and for socially-oriented and/or environmentally innovative businesses? How can these practices be reconciled with the demands of a return on investment?
How can we make sure that social and environmental criteria are given the same attention as financial criteria? How can transparency be improved as concerns activities developed with the savings of customers?
What kind of assistance for entrepreneurs would be needed if these lending practices are to be developed?
What are the economic and institutional barriers to the development of microcredit (at national, European and world level); what can be done to remove these barriers?
What kind of public–private coordination could help foster such practices?
What are the limits and the risks?

This Workshop has been prepared in coordination with the Association pour le droit à l'initiative économique (ADIE) and Nouvelle Economie Fraternelle (NEF).

Speakers

Chair: Hugues Sibille, Delegate Director, Crédit coopératif, France

Workshop Moderator: Claudia Nielsen, Chairperson of the Board, Banque Alternative Suisse, Switzerland

Case Study Presenters:

Nourredine Ayouch, President, Zakoura Foundation, Marocco
Nelson Kuria, Director, The Co-operative Insurance Company of Kenya, Kenya
Fabio Salviato, President, Banca Etica, Italy

Discussants:

Emmanuel de Lutzel, Microfinance Manager, BNP Paribas, France
Dominique Nouvellet, Chief Executive Officer, Groupe Siparex, France
Maria Nowak, President, European Microfinance Network (EMN)
Bruno Rousset, President, April Group, France
Frida Youssef, Coordinator, Commodity Finance and Risk Management, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)

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