Summary of SFP Projects and Programmes

The ILO’s Social Finance Programme (SFP) seeks to improve access to finance for workers and small firms, as well as to maximize the benefits of financial service usage. Social finance includes credit, savings, insurance and other products that help the poor to cope better with risk, take advantage of income-generating opportunities, organize and have a voice. The cornerstone of SFP’s strategy is the simultaneous attainment of social benefits and profitability; therefore, the work of the Social Finance Programme can be grouped into three areas: Knowledge Generation and Dissemination. Institutional Capacity Development, and Policy Analysis & Advice. Below is a listing of current and past SFP projects by area of work.

Knowledge Generation & Dissemination

The work of the Social Finance Programme in terms of knowledge generation and dissemination is to identify cases and initiatives that show how the financial sector can contribute to social justice. SFP reviews and analyzes externally produced evidence, or—and increasingly so—it launches its own experimental research initiatives as highlighted below.

• Microinsurance Innovation Facility
• Microfinance for Decent Work
• Social impact of agricultural investments in Africa

Institutional Capacity Development

SFP also seeks to strengthen the capacity of governments, employers and workers’ organizations, ILO staff and other relevant stakeholders (such as banks, credit union, cooperatives and microfinance institutions) through institutional capacity development, which also helps partners to link their work with decent work.

• Inclusive Finance for Workers
  1. Mobilization of Worker’s Cooperative, Ethiopia
• Microinsurance Projects
• Financial Education
• Making Microfinance Work: Managing for Product Diversity
• Making Microfinance Work: Managing for Improved Performance

Policy Analysis & Advice

Projects and programmes which fall under the heading of policy analysis and advice seek to promote and adopt social finance policies with the vision of decent work, thus strengthening their development potential and reducing the associated risks.

• Access to Insurance Initiative
• Social Finance and Public Policy
  1. Microfinance and Public Policy
  2. National Youth Funds in Africa
  3. The Social Impact of Microcredit in the European Context