A joint webinar was organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), African Rural and Agricultural Credit Association (AFRACA) and the Global Network for capacity building to increase access of financial services to small-scale fisheries (CAFI-SSF Network), to validate the recently concluded study findings with stakeholders particularly financial service providers that includes both banking and insurance organizations within east and west Africa region. The webinar was organized on 18 August 2021 and attended by more than 60 stakeholders from east and west Africa region financial institutions.

AFRACA Secretariat presented the study findings by particularly identifying the key financial service providers (FSP’s) that serve the small-scale fishers, fish farmers and provide access to credit, microfinance, and insurance services.

The study was a blend of desk research, online survey, and stakeholder consultations. The participants were a diverse mix of respondents viz; microfinance institutions, development banks, savings and credit cooperative societies (SACCO’s), commercial banks and insurance providers. The key findings of the survey highlighted were on the following aspects, i) the financial outreach or lending to the SSF, ii) scope of services and products offered to SSF, iii) performance of existing credit programme iv) involvement of various actors providing support services to SSF and v) capacity building needs for financial service providers. 

The study also identified financial institutions that were engaged in offering products and services to the SSF because of their microfinance mandate or the developmental finance mandates. Three financial institutions presented their institutional experience in provision of credit, microfinance, and insurance services to the SSF during the webinar. This was well received by other participating financial institutions as more stakeholders were interested in understanding how they may be able to address and overcome the institutional challenges, in order to serve the SSF sector and communities. The webinar participants were also asked to prioritize the capacity building needs of the institutions based on high, medium, or low priority.

For more information, please write to: AFRACA Secretariat at: afraca@africaonline.co.ke or CAFI SSF Network Coordinator: cafi-ssf@fao.org