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The FI4R endline survey reveals that non-employment income remains the primary source of funds for refugees in Uganda, though there has been an increase in the use of mobile money, savings groups, and cash held at home. The report highlights the role of implementing partners like Equity Bank Uganda Limited, VisionFund Uganda, and the Rural Finance Initiative in providing bank accounts, wholesale credit models, and digitized savings tools to refugees and host communities.

The Ethiopia Industrial Parks Jobs Protection Facility provided US$ 4,645,607 in wage and innovation incentives to 24 factories in Ethiopia's industrial parks, benefiting 31,511 workers. The facility successfully enabled 92% of participating factories to retain at least 80% of their pre-Facility workforce and helped 76% avoid revenue declines during the pandemic. Beyond job retention, the facility spurred innovation in PPE production and human capital development, while creating unintended positive outcomes such as improved financial inclusion for workers through the formalization of payroll via bank accounts and streamlined internal cash reconciliation processes for factories.

FSD Africa's 2022 Impact Report details the agency's efforts to deepen African capital markets and transition toward a green economy. Key achievements include mobilising £1.9 billion in long-term capital, supporting the issuance of pioneering gender bonds in Tanzania and Morocco, and expanding green finance initiatives. The report highlights the agency's 'green strategy' target to have 70% of its portfolio be green by 2025, alongside specific interventions in geothermal risk transfer, carbon markets, and COVID-19 emergency job protection in Ethiopia.

FSD Africa's 2022 Impact Report highlights the organization's shift toward green financing, with a goal of 70% of its portfolio being green. Key achievements include facilitating green bonds in 20 African countries, investing $0.25bn via the African Local Currency Bond Fund to support renewable energy, and launching the African Natural Capital Alliance to manage nature-related financial risks. The organization has increased its green financing commitment from £23 million in 2020 to approximately £52 million in 2022, with a target of over £122 million by 2025.

The Capital Markets Master Plan 2022 outlines a ten-year roadmap to transform Zambia's capital markets into an attractive international destination for long-term investment. The plan is structured around five thematic development areas: enhancing the government bond market, improving traditional security markets (equities and corporate bonds), developing innovative products (such as green bonds, ETFs, and REITs), building capacity across regulators and practitioners, and strengthening the regulatory environment. Key goals include increasing the Lusaka Securities Exchange (LuSE) market capitalization to 33% of GDP by 2031, launching the country's first green bond, and establishing a primary dealership system for government bonds. The strategy emphasizes the need for a transparent, efficient, and trusted market to mobilize private finance for infrastructure, agriculture, and energy projects.

The Youth Enterprise Grant (YEG) was a two-year pilot project starting in late 2018 that provided 1,000 youth in Mathare, Nairobi, with smartphones and enterprise grants totaling $1,200. Implemented by GiveDirectly for FSD Africa, the project aimed to determine if digital tools—including M-PESA for payments, Touch Doh for budgeting, and the Hustle Fiti Facebook group for business advice—could enhance financial literacy, money management, and business skills among micro-entrepreneurs in informal settlements.

The FSD Africa Code of Conduct (Version 4.0), updated on 14 September 2021, establishes the ethical standards and professional behavior required of all personnel associated with the organization. It defines the scope of application, management and employee responsibilities, and specific standards regarding integrity, conflict of interest, and safeguarding.

The report finds that COVID-19 significantly reduced refugee incomes from employment and self-employment, leaving non-employment income as the primary source of support. While there is openness to digitizing savings groups to improve speed and safety, significant barriers remain, including low smartphone ownership, high transaction costs, and fears that digital tools may undermine group cohesion and meeting attendance.

The Youth Enterprise Grants (YEG) pilot project provided approximately $1,200 in cash and a smartphone to 1,018 youth in Mathare, Nairobi. The project found that mobile money transfers are highly feasible in urban slum environments and lead to a significant shift toward self-employment, with the proportion of youth working for themselves increasing from 37% to 79%. While smartphones enhanced market access and technical skill acquisition via the internet, specific business-management apps had limited take-up. Financial well-being improved markedly, with the percentage of recipients able to meet daily expenses rising from 28% to 82%. The report highlights a strong preference for grants over loans and an unmet demand for digital financial services that allow users to 'lock' or compartmentalise funds for saving.

The report finds that while there is broad stakeholder interest and significant latent potential for green projects in Ghana—particularly in renewable energy, green housing, and water infrastructure—the green bond market is currently nascent with no prior issuances. Key barriers include a shallow debt capital market, a lack of formal issuance guidelines, limited technical capacity to identify eligible project pipelines, and a mismatch between issuer and investor expectations regarding pricing. The study suggests that government leadership, such as a sovereign green bond issuance planned for 2021/22, and the development of a dedicated green segment on the Ghana Stock Exchange are critical for catalyzing the market. It also emphasizes the need for credit enhancements and technical assistance to bridge the gap between speculative project ideas and bankable green bonds.

The report identifies significant barriers to digitising cash transfers in Nigeria, including regulatory restrictions on agent e-float, low recipient digital literacy, and a lack of economic incentive for financial service providers (FSPs) to serve poor, rural populations. While mobile phone penetration is relatively high, most recipients use basic feature phones and prefer cash due to ease of access and lack of network reliability. The document proposes segmenting recipients by 'digital payment readiness' and digitising community savings groups as entry points for financial inclusion. It also highlights the inefficiency of current 'virtual accounts' that require 100% cash-out, arguing for a transition toward permanent digital wallets and merchant payment systems to reduce liquidity burdens and fraud.

The report outlines a strategy to move Nigeria's humanitarian and social protection payments from physical cash to an open-loop digital payment ecosystem. It identifies key barriers, including low recipient digital literacy, regulatory restrictions on mobile money operators, and a lack of integrated beneficiary registries. The roadmap proposes four main pillars: enhancing coordination between agencies via a shared dashboard and NIN integration, segmenting recipients by digital readiness, developing the digital ecosystem through community savings groups and merchant payment transitions, and conducting regulatory advocacy to address PSB licensing and USSD costs.

The report identifies that most humanitarian and social protection cash transfers in Nigeria are delivered as physical cash due to a bank-led market and a lack of robust digital financial service (DFS) ecosystems. Key barriers include restrictive agent e-float limits set by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), low recipient digital literacy, and a lack of economic incentive for financial service providers (FSPs) to maintain permanent accounts for poor recipients. The document recommends segmenting beneficiaries by digital readiness, strengthening foundational identity through National Identification Number (NIN) registration, and digitising merchant payments to reduce the liquidity burden of cash disbursements.

FSD Africa defines 'sustainable futures' as a framework ensuring current interventions do not adversely affect future generations or other groups, emphasizing a 'just transition' and the preservation of five types of capital: financial, manufactured, human, social, and natural. The organization assesses its projects through two lenses: the impact of interventions on these capitals and the dependency of project success on a stable enabling environment. To measure progress, FSD Africa utilizes a mix of country-level macro indicators (such as the Gender Inequity Index and Corruption Perception Index), social impact indicators, and market system change metrics, specifically tracking 'Green finance mobilised'. Practical examples of this approach include facilitating over £100m in Green Bonds in Nigeria and £35.3million for green student accommodation in Kenya.

FSD Africa, in collaboration with The Good Economy and Tandem, has developed a four-step framework to measure how financial sector deepening impacts job creation. The framework emphasizes the use of full-time equivalent (FTE) metrics to account for underemployment and employs a sectoral approach to assess job quality and 'decent work' multipliers. The process involves a theory-based assessment of materiality, estimation of direct and indirect jobs, a decent jobs assessment using sector proxies, and optional bespoke research for high-impact projects.

The FSD Africa Jobs Framework provides a systematic approach to measuring employment effects by linking financial sector innovations to real economy outcomes. It focuses on gross job creation across micro (firm) and meso (sector) levels, using a 'Decent Jobs Assessment' to evaluate job quality, inclusion, and geographic need. The framework emphasizes a contribution-based approach rather than strict attribution, utilizing investment multipliers and sector-based proxies to estimate impact while avoiding macro-level induced effects.

FSD Africa reports that between 2012 and 2020, it reached over 5.47 million people and 3.2 million MSMEs through financial inclusion and capital market projects. Key achievements include catalysing £1.53 billion in long-term capital, supporting 27,000 jobs, and effecting approximately 130 regulatory changes. The organization is now transitioning to 'FSD 2.0', shifting focus toward 'sustainable futures', jobs, and basic services, with a particular emphasis on green finance and Covid-19 recovery.

The document discusses how the perceived risk of illicit financial flows (IFFs) leads to de-risking in regional economic hubs, which negatively impacts capital flows and developmental outcomes for both hubs and integrated spoke countries. It emphasizes the need for regulatory frameworks that ensure financial integrity without undermining financial inclusion.

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the Malawian insurance sector by stagnating sales due to a reliance on physical distribution and reducing premium income as customers struggled to pay. Insurers responded by digitising the value chain, offering premium holidays, and adopting remote work infrastructure. While the pandemic increased demand for critical illness and income protection products, it created liquidity and solvency pressures due to decreased investment returns and higher operational expenses for digitisation. The Reserve Bank of Malawi provided regulatory relief by suspending on-site examinations and offering a one-year holiday on supervisory levies.

The document details how COVID-19 containment measures disrupted the Zimbabwean insurance sector, highlighting challenges in remote work, stagnating sales due to the lack of e-signatures, and anticipated financial pressures. It examines the responses of insurers and the regulator (IPEC), while identifying opportunities for digital transformation and product innovation to support economic recovery.