The second Microfinance Summit Nepal concluded on 16 February 2010 with a ten-point declaration formulating various requests to the Constituent Assembly, National Planning Commission, Ministry of Finance, Nepal Rastra Bank and other relevant organisations of the sector.

The summit's main theme was “Microfinance for Inclusive Economic Growth”, and among many issues, how to improve the funding for the microfinance sector, how to improve the client retention for microfinance services, how to make microfinance more inclusive towards excluded groups as well as how to improve credit schemes and create a model for value chain finance in microfinance, etc were regularly discussed.

GIZ/INCLUDE, being one of the lead contributors of the Microfinance Summit 2010, presented two working papers on ‘Business Models for Value Chain Finance Through Cooperatives’ and on ‘How Do We Enhance Entrepreneurial Skills of MFI Clients?’ sharing experiences from its programme approach and work in hilly and Terai districts of the country.

More than 700 people involved in microfinance participated in the summit and 19 working papers were presented during the three-day event. The next summit will be held in February 2013. To view all presented working papers and the declaration, please visit: www.microfinancesummitnepal.org

Fifteen microfinance development banks, 45 financial intermediary non-government organisations and over 5,000 cooperatives are currently active in Nepal providing microfinance services to more than 1.8 million people from rural areas.   

GIZ/INCLUDE and the Microfinance Summit: Helping Nepal grow - THT 100214