PRODUCTS AND SERVICES
The offer remains focused on lending
Although Asia is the continent in which the institutions intermediating with microenterprises attract the most savings, the sector’s offer remains focused on lending. Indeed, up to the 90s, and although public and postal banks attracted high levels of savings, no interest was shown in this sector by private financial institutions, as they considered that people had no demand for it and that it was not a viable proposition. Since that time, the offer in savings has developed, yet with little variety and a prevalence of mandatory savings.
The range of credit products is fairly diversified. The offer in most countries involves the standard loans for working and fixed capital, as well as more sophisticated products such as mortgage loans, education loans and emergency loans.
Micro-leasing is steadily being developed, above all in Bangladesh where Grameen Bank has been offering this product since 1992, and also in India, where CARE began to roll out this product through a project for rickshaw drivers.
A non-banking product that is becoming of general application is micro-insurance, with over 400 schemes identified in countries such as Bangladesh, Cambodia, the Philippines, India, Laos, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
The methodology of group lending continues to be the most widespread
The methodology of group lending continues be the most widespread in Asia. The individual methodology is slowly gaining ground in countries whose microfinance sector is more mature, such as Cambodia or Mongolia. The institutions in Bangladesh have been particularly innovative in the methodology of lending, as can be noted through the models of Grameen Bank or ASA, which are being replicated in Asia and Africa, albeit with very limited results. In India, the programme “Self-help Group Bank Linkage Programme” initiated by NABARD in the 90s and which involves linking informal self-help groups in remote areas with commercial banks, has become the biggest supplier of credit in India and a benchmark for cooperation between the public and private sectors and informal organisations.
