Doc 0838/15 8 September 2015 (Vers. 1.1.) JO 22 nd WSBI GENERAL ASSEMBLY Washington, 23 September 2015 Item 4: Progress Report by the Managing Director (Reporting period: April – August 2015) The members of the General Assembly are invited to take note of and comment on the Progress Report on WSBI activities for the period from April – August 2015. World Savings and Retail Banking Institute - aisbl Rue Marie-Thérèse, 11 ￭ B-1000 Bruxelles ￭ Tel: + 32 2 211 11 11 ￭ Fax: + 32 2 211 11 99 E-mail: first [email protected]￭ Website: www.wsbi-esbg.org
Transcript
Doc 0838/15 8 September 2015(Vers. 1.1.) JO
22nd WSBI GENERAL ASSEMBLY Washington, 23 September 2015
Item 4: Progress Report by the Managing Director
(Reporting period: April – August 2015)
The members of the General Assembly are invited to take note of and comment on the Progress Report on WSBI activities for the period from April – August 2015.
World Savings and Retail Banking Institute - aisblRue Marie-Thérèse, 11 ￭ B-1000 Bruxelles ￭ Tel: + 32 2 211 11 11 ￭ Fax: + 32 2 211 11 99
2. Strengthen profile and influence of WSBI lobbying activities on relevant G20 and other priority advocacy files
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3. Implementation of the Marrakech Declaration workplan7
4. Direct support to WSBI members 9 International tenders and grant funding 11 Training and exchange of best practices’ activities
11 WSBI Regional Group Activities 13
Africa Regional Group 13 Asia/Pacific Regional Group 14 Latin America and Caribbean Regional Group (GRULAC)
16 Microfinance activities 18 Digitalisation 19 World Savings Day 20 Interaction with Child and Youth Finance International
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5. Implementation of WSBI-ESBG transformation plan20
Adjust the WSBI service offer 20 Membership 21 Raise Internal standards 21
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1. Introduction and Summary:
This Progress Report covers the period of April – August 2015 and is an update of the Progress Report (Doc 0238/15) submitted to the WSBI Board of Directors in Istanbul in April 2015.
The main messages that emerge from an evaluation of activities over the reference period are:
Advocacy on international policy issues continues with high-and working-level meetings with international policy makers and standards setters such as the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the Financial Stability Board, the OECD, the International Organisation of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) as well as with the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) and the European Financial Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG). Close contacts are also maintained with the World Bank Group, the Inter-American Development Bank, as well as interaction with the Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI).WSBI developed and shared on 23 April 2015 its Institutional Positions with the Central Bank Governors and Finance Ministers of the G20 as a follow-up to their 16-17 April meeting.The G20 leaders’ summit in November 2015 will be hosted in Antalya and WSBI has updated its institutional messages in order to align WSBI actions with G20 priorities and showcase our positions and messages.
One of the main highlights during the reference period was the WSBI Commitment to the World Bank Group’s Universal Financial Access (UFA) 2020 Goal. Work is ongoing to collect data from members in order to be able to make a specific numeric commitment to UFA rather than the generic statement of “An Account for Everyone” which is what was contained in the Commitments announced by the World Bank Group in April.
WSBI is in the final stages of concluding a strategic partnership with the World Bank’s Financial Inclusion Global Practice with the purpose of providing support to selected WSBI members as part of their UFA 2020 programme. This will include the creation of an enabling regulatory and operational environment as well as technical assistance and capacity building.
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WSBI has stepped up its activities in the micro finance area, also through participation in the European Microfinance Platforms’ Action Group on digital innovation for financial empowerment.
The flagship WSBI-CaixaBank Conference on the topic of “Innovation in Payments – at the Forefront of Retail Banking”, that took place in Barcelona on 13 & 14 April, was a great success and attracted members and participants from all over the wold. This is a further testimony to the global nature of innovation and the importance for savings and retail banks to respond to the opportunities and threats of digitalisation.
WSBI’s flagship Doubling Savings Accounts programme comes to an end on 30 November. The final major event of the programme will be a workshop on 23 September in Washington DC under the title ‘Making Small-scale savings work for everyone in a digitised world’, which will be accompanied by a publication that summarises the lessons learned.
During the reporting period, the preparations for the 24th World Congress of Savings and Retail Banks, to be held on 24 and 25 September in Washington D.C. have been ongoing. Just as the Retail Banking Conference in Brussels and the Innovation in Payments conference in Barcelona, the main focus of the Congress is the digitisation and its influence on WSBI members.
The following is an overview of the main activities carried out under the various headings of the WSBI 2015 workplan (Doc 0774/14).
2. Strengthen profile and influence of WSBI lobbying activities on relevant G20 and other priority advocacy files:
WSBI and its members have expressed in their letter sent on 23 April to the G20 Leaders that they welcome the ambitious agenda of the G20 under the Turkish Presidency and its focus on promoting inclusive and robust growth through collective action. They are keen to participate in the development of such plans and wish to highlight the potential impact that such policies may have on the activities of the savings and retail banks that are represented within WSBI; these are characterised by their responsible approach to business, their close involvement in local communities and their contribution to the real economy. In line with the priorities of the Turkish Presidency, some of WSBI’s main messages delivered to the G20 Leaders can be summarised as follows:
Strengthening the global recovery and lifting the potential: Long-term financing / MSMEs’ access to finance: Capital market instruments are not a viable alternative to bank
loans for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs). Rather, both forms of finance are complementary.
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The regulatory framework should be structured in such a way as to ensure that savings and retail banks can continue providing access to finance to MSMEs, which are the backbone of the economy.
A ‘one-size-fits-all’-approach (regulation designed for large, global players, but then implemented for the smallest local banks as well) harms the vital role of locally rooted banks of supplying funds to MSMEs.
Enhancing resilience: Building resilient financial institutions: There is no necessity to introduce and apply the net stable funding
ratio (NSFR), for it would delay macroeconomic recovery and create further liquidity shortages.
A binding leverage ratio should not deflect the ratio from its initial purpose as a simple backstop within the Basel III rulebook, and therefore it should be limited to a maximum of 3% and applied only at a group consolidated level.
WSBI welcomes the principles submitted by the Financial Stability Board (FSB) in respect of creating a more effective Risk Appetite Framework (RAF).
WSBI still has several concerns in relation to the introduction of the currently discussed total loss absorption capacity (TLAC). It is of utmost importance that the TLAC framework is flexible enough to adapt to the already existing resolution framework at national level, such as the BRRD and MREL in the EU. Furthermore, WSBI is concerned that the TLAC may end up applying to all banks, rather than only to global systemic banks (G-SIFIs), since market discipline will oblige non-G-SIFIs to increase their capital requirements to meet market expectations.
An appropriate regulation of the shadow banking area needs to be developed, encompassing a specific regulation regime which should be applied to the other financial intermediaries (OFIs) that contribute to financial inclusion’s purposes.
WSBI members support the on-going worldwide initiatives to address tax avoidance and evasion, and they underline the importance of having one system for multilateral automatic exchange of information (AEOI).
Buttressing sustainability: Development – improving access to financial services:
WSBI is fully committed to the goal of ‘an account for everyone’ and is one of the Coalition of Partners that has committed to the achievement of the World Bank Group’s Goal of Universal Financial Access by 2020.
To be sustainable, branch and agent networks may need to be supplemented by digital delivery mechanisms to reach out to rural areas. Furthermore support is still needed to remove obstacles to partnership models, e.g. between banks and mobile money operators or via agency models.
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The G20 leaders’ summit in November this year will be hosted in Antalya and WSBI will share with the G20 Leaders its updated institutional positions as submitted to the WSBI Board (Doc 0876/15).
WSBI has also responded to several consultations and drafted letters between April and August 2015 in order to share its views with the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) and other international bodies: WSBI Response to the Basel Committee Consultation on Guidance
on Accounting for Expected Credit Losses; Letter to BCBS on the Leverage Ratio;
Letters to IASB and EFRAG on the Deferral of IFRS 9 – Conglomerates.
Throughout the year, WSBI is in constant contact with the key international policy makers and standards-setters international institutions responsible for regulating and supervising the financial services sector. On the working level the BCBS and the Financial Stability Board (FSB) have been fuelled with responses to consultations (as aforementioned) and further discussions will be held in the coming months on the orientations taken at international level on the NSFR, the IRRBB, capital floors, risk weights in the standardised and IRB approaches. These issues are of paramount importance for the retail and savings bank members of WSBI due to the impact they will have on their capacity to keep lending to the real economy. WSBI has targeted (and will continue to target) co-chairs of BCBS Task Forces, benefiting in some cases from members’ introduction. The Markets Regulation Committee also initiated contacts with IOSCO through a meeting with its Deputy Secretary General in Madrid on 29 May 2015 in order to exchange views on IOSCO’s activities and international trends.
The meeting of the Coordination Committee in Paris on 21 & 22 May was the occasion for WSBI-ESBG members to have an exchange with Mr. André Laboul, Deputy Director, OECD Directorate for Financial and Enterprise Affairs on the OECD’s contribution to and view on the G20 priorities, including long-term investment, SMEs and access to finance. OECD’s leading role in the field of Financial Education was also highlighted. It was agreed that it would be beneficial to continue the dialogue between OECD and WSBI-ESBG and Mr LABOUL seemed open to further meetings and/or receiving input and information from WSBI-ESBG and its members.
The WSBI Board of Directors meeting in Istanbul on 16 & 17 April allowed for an exchange with the Turkish G20 Presidency as Deputy Executive Manager of the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey, Dr. Koray Alper, attended the opening session of the meeting
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to exchange views with the WSBI members on G20 priorities and to showcase the new focus on SME Finance within the framework of the Turkish Presidency. Indeed, the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) has been asked by the G20 to establish a World SME Forum, which will act as a conduit to voice the expectations and concerns of the SME world to the G20 governments and the platform of business representatives called B20.
On the financial inclusion front, WSBI was one of a broad Coalition of Partners that have issued numeric commitments to contribute to the World Bank Group’s Universal Financial Access (UFA) 2020 Goal. These commitments were announced at a flagship event during the WBG Spring meetings on 17 April 2015. The World Bank press release and a list of the commitments made can be found on the following link: http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2015/04/17/world-bank-group-coalition- partners-make-commitments-accelerate-universal-financial-access.It should be noted that WSBI-ESBG was not in a position to come up with a specific numeric commitment at that time, as this would have required endorsement by members. Thus the WSBI-ESBG commitment refers to the goal of “an account for everyone” contained in the Marrakech Declaration that was adopted at the WSBI World Congress in 2012. A specific numeric commitment is however expected from WSBI-ESBG by September 2015 at the latest. This is why, after an initial consultation of the WSBI Regional Group Members in Asia, Africa and Latin America to assess the potential appetite and the ability to provide data to support the proposed numeric commitment (see WSBI Member Input No 2/15), the Joint Office launched a data collection exercise with all WSBI-ESBG members by means of a Member Input and questionnaire (See JO Member Input No 12/15). The objective is to come up with a specific WSBI-ESBG numeric commitment, which is to be endorsed by the WSBI General Assembly at its next meeting in Washington DC on 23 September 2015 (Doc 0906/15).During the reference period and as agreed at the 77th Coordination Committee meeting in Paris in May 2015, WSBI submitted an expression of interest to the Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) to become a Knowledge Resource Partner (Doc 0731/15). The rationale was that the possibility of having access to the financial policy makers and regulators that make up the AFI membership would be a unique and valuable opportunity to convey WSBI lobbying messages at the coal face, so to speak. It would also constitute an excellent platform to influence the policies and positions of the G 20 in the making through participation in the various working groups and initiatives that AFI organises on topics of particular interest to WSBI and its members.
The outcome of this exercise was that AFI confirmed that an engagement with WSBI would be of significant interest to AFI Members and the AFI Secretariat. They had however come to the decision that a Knowledge Resource Partnership was not the appropriate format for such engagement given WSBI’s private sector membership, despite the fact that they were aware that this also included state owned banks and post banks. Their proposal therefore was for WSBI to become a partner in their Public/Private Dialogue Platform (PPD). It was emphasised that this decision was not exclusive to WSBI, but was a generic one that they had adopted for other apex organisations such as GSMA and some other associations that had recently proposed a systematic partnership with AFI, possibly the International Finance Institute (IIF).Unfortunately, although such a PPD partnership would be very interesting for WSBI and its members, it comes with a hefty annual membership fee of USD 100,000. In addition they are expected to contribute financial and knowledge resources to support AFI programmes and activities. A Knowledge Resource Partnership, on the other hand, does not involve a membership fee (see Doc 461/15 for further details). This has the unfortunate consequence that the financial inclusion agenda will now be dominated to a large extent by large global organisations such as MasterCard, VISA, GSMA as well as large commercial banks, which are beginning to consider finance inclusion as a new business opportunity.
Last but not least it should be noted that WSBI’s application to join the IFC SME Finance Forum should be finalised imminently. The text of the Forum’s membership agreement has been agreed and the final signature process is in course. Announcements about the new members of the Forum will be made formally at the Global 2015 SME Finance Forum which will take place in Antalya, Turkey on 15 & 16 November 2015.It is recalled that WSBI-ESBG submitted its application for membership of the Forum in Q1 of 2015, after receiving positive advice from the WSBI- ESBG Coordination Committee. The WSBI affiliation will consist of a two year complimentary membership of the Forum with full privileges for WSBI- ESBG staff. The free membership may be extendable indefinitely provided that WSBI-ESBG can help the Forum engage and retain at least three members of WSBI- ESBG as individual members of the Forum.
3. Implementation of the Marrakech Declaration workplan
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Progress on the implementation of the Marrakech Declaration workplan is summarised below under the main headings that are applied at national level for financial inclusion strategies as defined by the World Bank.
Stock-taking data and diagnostics In order to be able to report progress towards the Marrakech Declaration’s goal of ‘an account for everyone’ at the WSBI World Congress in 2015, it was seen as essential that WSBI should obtain figures from members from to estimate the current status of members’ contribution to financial access (e.g., by comparison with the World Bank FINDEX database) and then to monitor progress. The most appropriate vehicle to gather such statistics is the WSBI annual questionnaire.Given that the responses to the 2013 and 2014 questionnaires were inadequately completed, the Joint Office came up with the proposal, which was approved by the Coordination Committee and the WSBI Board, of developing some cross-cutting indicators from data that is collected from the member institutions involved in the WSBI Doubling Savings Accounts Programme on an individual basis and to analyse the data collected against these financial inclusion indicators. The hope was that that this evidence based approach could be used to convince the majority of WSBI members of the importance of collecting this data, which can also be used for the purpose of highlighting the role of the individual organisations in their countries and regions. As indicated in the last progress report WSBI members in six countries have been selected to participate in this new approach: El Salvador, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Morocco and Indonesia. The reason is that data is being collected quarterly from these members as part of the WSBI Doubling Savings Accounts Programme. It was agreed that these WSBI members should report on a set of indicators covering the following dimensions of financial inclusion:
- Affordability: how affordable are the products offered by the institutions to persons with low incomes?
- Usability: are the products being used?- Proximity: which channels are available and how easy is it for
customers to reach the institution?- Sustainability: is the business sustainable?
This approach and methodology was approved initially by Fedecrédito in El Salvador and the data was computed in a study covering the analysis of these aspects (Doc 1141/14) as reported in the last progress report. In effect this study showed that, in the case of Fedecrédito, it appears that most commitments taken through the Marrakech Declaration have been fulfilled.
In the meantime similar studies have been carried out for WSBI’s Indonesian member BTN (Doc 367/15) as well as Post Bank Uganda (Doc 397/15). All of these studies have shown positive results and represent
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encouraging examples of financial inclusion good practices implemented by WSBI members in accordance with the Marrakech Declaration.
In the light of the new development of WSBI’s commitment to the World Bank Group’s Universal Financial Access (UFA) 2020 goal, the proposed way forward on the Marrakech Declaration work plan will need to be reviewed in line with the World Bank Group’s strategy for monitoring and evaluating progress on the UFA numerical commitments by WSBI – ESBG and by other parties that have made such commitments. Their plans in this respect are not yet available, but hopefully, details will be forthcoming soon. In this context it is important to note that this UFA 2020 goal is an interim milestone towards the World Bank Group’s goal of universal financial inclusion by 2030 and that this latter goal is precisely the objective of the Marrakech Declaration. Thus these two goals are very complementary, but actions will need to be put in place to ensure that these objectives can be met and documented in an evidence based approach. In this context it should however be noted that a that can be made by the financial services sector.
Strategy building/revisionThe work plan stated that WSBI would draw on lessons from the WSBI Doubling Savings Accounts Programme to stimulate debate amongst members and offer training & consultancy to members where possible. The programme will come to an end in November 2015, so the main focus during the reference period has been on completing ongoing work, final evaluations and preparations for a high quality event to be held in Washington DC on 23 September prior to the WSBI World Congress. The Report on WSBI’s Journey in making small- scale savings work has also been completed and will be published in September. This report as well as the final report of the project are very interesting in terms of best practices and lessons learnt in a number of areas and these should be widely disseminated amongst the broader WSBI network as well as stakeholders.
Targets & objectives
In September 2013, members of AFI (Alliance for Financial Inclusion) agreed to strengthen their member countries’ commitments under the Maya Declaration by signing the Sasana Accord, which included a provision to set measurable national financial inclusion goals in the efforts to achieve full financial access.
WSBI member countries that have signed the Maya Declaration are:
Benin*BelarusBrazilBurkina Faso*
ColombiaCote d’IvoireEthiopia
Indonesia*Kenya*Madagascar
MexicoMongoliaMorocco*Mozambique
NigeriaPakistanPanamaPeru*
Tanzania*TogoUganda*
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Chile Ghana*Guatemala
MalaysiaMali
Namibia Senegal*
Zambia
WSBI offers support to members in these countries by way of T&C to align their own targets and performance indicators with national financial inclusion goals and targets. Those countries above marked * denote where WSBI has been providing assistance.
Public sector policies/actions
Actions and dialogue with the Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion (GPFI) key implementing partners during the reference period are summarised below:
Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI): as mentioned above, WSBI has approached AFI with an expression of interest to become a Knowledge Resource Partner. Although AFI have expressed keen interest in a partnership with WSBI, they have proposed a fee-paying partnership in their Public/Private Dialogue Platform (PPD) -(see section 2, page ?)
Better than Cash Alliance (BTCA): WSBI continues to be an active member of the Knowledge Management Sub-committee which exists to help identify key knowledge products, contribute to knowledge product development and support dissemination. During the previous reference period, funding was obtained from BTCA for an access to finance project in favour of FEPCMAC Peru, and this project is ongoing.
CGAP: At working level, CGAP is represented on the Steering Committee of WSBI’s ‘doubling savings accounts’ programme and excellent relations are established. Continuous efforts to forge tangible partnerships are on-going, currently in relation to potential WSBI cooperation with CGAP in the design of their ‘customer centricity’ tool.
IFC: Engagement on a day to day basis with the International
Finance Corporation (IFC) is undertaken by responding to M-SME Finance related tenders. They are also party to the discussions) with the World Bank concerning a strategic partnership (see below). WSBI has also been approached by the IFC to participate in the Responsible Finance Forum which will take place in Antalya, Turkey from 7- 9 September 2015.
World Bank Group: Excellent relations exist between WSBI and the World Bank Financial Inclusion Global Practice. During the reference period, active discussions have taken place to develop a
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strategic partnership between WSBI and the World Bank Group, with the purpose of providing support to WSBI members as part of their Universal Financial Access 2020 Programme.
4. Direct support to WSBI members
A new contract commenced in August 2015 to provide technical assistance to Finance Trust Bank Uganda for a savings mobilisation project funded by Incofin, a Belgian based investment management fund.
An expression of interest is still pending for an EC funded technical assistance project in favour of La Poste Tunisia.
Applications are still outstanding to the Better than Cash Alliance (BTCA) on behalf of ASBEA (Association of Savings Banks of East Africa); and KPOSB Kenya. We understand for the time being that BTCA is prioritising projects elsewhere (in Peru). In this connection, the project to support FEPCMAC Peru’s mobile banking project (see previous section) for which WSBI secured funding in the previous reference period is ongoing.
In addition to the WSBI Doubling Savings Accounts Programme, which supports members in Burkina Faso, El Salvador, Kenya, Lesotho, Morocco, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, and Vietnam, WSBI also has ongoing projects in favour of its members in Benin and Senegal under the African Postal Financial Services Initiative, and in favour of its member in Ghana in connection with phase 2 of a data analytics project supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Furthermore the following activities have taken place during the reference period:
A workshop on segmenting customer account data called ‘small data analytics’ was held in Brussels with the East African project partners in Brussels from 28-30 April 2015. Small data analytics to better understand who of the customer base is likely to become active in a certain period of time has become an important determiner of banks customer reengagement strategies. The learning will help to develop Training & Consultancy (T&C) toolkits to tackle account dormancy at members.
The positive conclusions of the first phase of the Programmes ‘big data analytics’ project led to a second phase that is ongoing through 2015, again involving HFC Bank and Airtel Ghana, to develop and test an innovative HFC Bank mobile savings product on the Airtel Money platform that combines features of mobile and savings products. Behavior-based propensity scores
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are being used to segment Airtel’s subscriber base and test targeted marketing campaigns to drive high quality customer acquisition for HFC Bank.
More work has been done to better understand client behaviour in particular that of the youth segment and bank agents. Diary research with low income segment households to better understand cash flow of young people within households in rural Uganda has been added to an extensive research on what young male and female aspire and what motivates them to save and use a savings product. Furthermore, the agent survey and agent relocation work in Kenya and Tanzania continued and lessons are being shared on the Association of Banks in Eastern Africa (ASBEA) level.
The ASBEA level working group on sharing best practices and monitoring each other’s progress in village banking continued to share best practices on how to make village banking work. WSBI together with the group is working on a case study and has been invited to share their experience at the SEEP Savings Group conference in Lusaka in November 2015.
The proof of concept of PocketBank-SchoolBank in partnership with CYFI (see Doc 0325/15) and BeeOne from WSBI member Erste Bank has kicked off with two WSBI members: El Salvadorian member Fedecredito and National Savings Bank from Sri Lanka now totalling the number of WSBI beneficiaries under the Programme to twelve. Once proven, the concept which uses innovative distribution channels and technology (mobile application) with the goal of empowering the use of financial services for children and youth in a cost efficient way, aims at rolling out the concept to other members.
During the first half of the year six projects (El Salvador, Indonesia, Kenya, Morocco, Tanzania, Uganda) formed part of an intense evaluation process which acknowledged the tremendous institutional change those banks had undergone throughout the Programme now being more consciously and better placed to serve lower income segments in their respective markets. The evaluators further recommended that at the end of this grant, a follow-up program should be envisaged to build on the successes and lessons learned, to scale-up (some) existing projects and extend the program to other WSBI members. The banks visited by the evaluators would be ideally placed to act as role models / mentors for future potential beneficiaries.
International tenders and grant funding
On-going assignments: WSBI doubling savings accounts programme HFC Bank / Airtel data analytics project – Phase 2: Proof of
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Haiti: technical assistance to Sofihdes and ACME IFAD African Postal Financial Services Initiative Senegal: technical assistance to ACEP (Alliance de Crédit et
d’Epargne pour la Production) Asian Development Bank: Developing AML/CFT approaches,
methodologies and controls for non-bank financial institutions Tunisia: Training in risk analysis at BFPME (Banque de
Financement des Petites et Moyennes Enterprises) Uganda : Finance Trust Bank : savings mobilisation project FEPCMAC Peru: Access to finance in remote rural areas EC Framework contract EBRD West Balkans and Croatia Framework contract
Since the beginning of 2014, WSBI has refocused its T&C activities almost entirely on the financial inclusion agenda. Currently, proposals are pending for seven contracts funded by the multilateral/bilateral institutions with a further six expressions of interest outstanding. In addition, discussions are on-going with a range of public funders and private foundations seeking to raise grant funding to support financial inclusion related projects in favour of WSBI members. Notably, a strategic partnership agreement between WSBI and the World Bank is under discussion to support the World Bank’s Universal Financial Access 2020 programme; and detailed discussions are under discussion with MasterCard Foundation to develop a potential multi-country programme in favour of WSBI members in Africa to build on the lessons of the WSBI doubling savings accounts programme.
Training and exchange of best practice activities
The training activity has for objective to respond to members’ needs for growth in banking and management skills along the line with their transformation into retail banks. The activity also includes the organisation of platforms with the aim to share best practices in strategic areas regarding, in particular, the institutional strengthening and development of innovative customer centric policies.
DATES TITLE BENEFICIARIES VENUE
24-25-26 April
International conference on MicroFinance – FEPCMAC Peru – sharing best practices on village banking
FEPCMAC Huancayo, Peru
24-25-26 May Regional training on Leading
in times of Changes
All African Members at the ARGM
Dar-Es-Salaam
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15-20 June
Internal conference on How to improve business growth and performance within Gabonese Postebank
La Poste Gabonaise Libreville -
9-11 June National training Operational Risk Management
FECEDREDITO Salvador
The September WSBI-ESBG’s International Summer Forum which welcomed 40 participants in 2014, including WSBI members, did not take place this year due to its proximity to the WSBI Congress in September 2015.
Follow up of two cooperation agreements signed last February: 1. On 26 August, Mr. De Noose met with Dr. Atiur Rahman, the
Governor of Bangladesh Bank, in order to define concrete cooperation projects in the areas of financial inclusion, mobile banking, SME finance, rural finance and financial education. This is taking place within the framework of the Cooperation Agreement that was signed last February with the Bangladesh Bank Training Academy and the Institute of Bank Management that the Governor presides. Mr. De Noose will also meet with several banks’ CEO’s in order to discuss potential memberships.
2. Dr. Sinisa Naumoski, the Executive Director of the Academy for Banking and Information Technology (ABIT) of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) with whom the WSBI also signed a Cooperation Agreement last February has invited the WSBI to provide a training for Banks’ CEO’s on “Management strategy alignment”. This event will take place on 1 and 2 October 2015.
Other training seminars in preparation: Those should take place during the last quarter of the year.
The participation in the African regional Group Meeting that was preceded by a well appreciated training was the opportunity to identify a couple of training needs in the African region (Senegal, Zambia, Zimbabwe), as illustrated below.
SEPTEMBER DATES PLACE TOPICS1 PosteFinances SN 14-15-16
September (3 days)
BXL Branch Management and visits
OCTOBER2 Banking
Association of 1-2 October (2 days)
Skopje Management Strategy Alignment
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Macedonia (ABIT)3 PosteFinances
Senegal28-29-30 October
Dakar Diriger en période de changement
4 NatSave – Zambia 26 – 30 October
Lusaka Branch Management and Sales and Communications
5 NatSave – Zambia First week of November (tbc)
Lusaka Branch Management and Sales and Communications
WSBI Regional Group Activities
Africa
African Regional Group meeting 2015The 21st African Regional Group meeting on next frontier in accessing financial services, took place in Dar Es Salaam from 25th to 29th May 2015 on the kind invitation of Tanzania Postal Bank with participants from 20 countries. During the meeting, members called for more involvement of their local public authorities, which are a major shareholder of their institutions, in the scope of the WSBI’s lobbing activities. They also plead for more solidarity in the business cooperation between WSBI members. Furthermore, African member’s input where requested on topics of: numerical commitment on the World Bank Group’s Universal Financial Access 2020 Program, G20 Turkish Presidency, World Savings Day celebration, MoU with Child and Youth Finance International (School Bank, Global Money week, & research). Their positions will be collected by the WSBI secretariat and communicated accordingly.Some certificates of appreciation was delivered to managers of Post Bank Uganda, la Poste du Gabon, National Savings Bank Zambia and SONAPOST Burkina Faso in recognition of their particular efforts for the promotion of the network.
Other salient points include:
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NOVEMBER
6 People’s Own savings-bank of Zimbabwe
TBC Hararé AML and Counter Terrorist Attacks
7 Non members in Middle East
12 to 16 December 2015
Beyrouth
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Renewal of African Region president committee for the next 3 as follow: 1. President: Mr. SABASABA MOSHINGI- CEO Tanzania Postal
Zimbabwe. Creation of Working Groups to deliberate on key issues influencing
members’ businesses. 1. Working Group 1: Innovation Finance – Chair CNCE – Cote
d’Ivoire 2. Working Group 2 : Micro and Small Enterprises– Chair
Tanzania Postal bank3. Working Group 3 : Rural Finance – Chair NATSAVE – Zambia4. Working Group 4 : Financial Education – Chair –Finance
Trust Bank –Uganda
Finally, members agreed to take advantage of their presence at the WSBI World Congress to organize a round table the afternoon of 25th September to discuss and deliberate on the road map of the African Regional President mandate, the terms of reference and action plans of the working groups, and any other relevant matter to the region.
WSBI at the International Forum of Finance in sub-Saharan Africa in Cote d’Ivoire on June 2015
From June 15-17th BNI Gestion (Banque Nationale D’Investissement) and the WSBI members in West Africa, hosted the 2nd edition of the International Forum of Finance in sub-Saharan Africa on the topic of “An African Business Model to improve the financial inclusion” 600 participants from 15 countries discussed on various issues of financial inclusion ranging from micro-small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), financial education and culture, micro insurance and funding.WSBI participated in the discussions of the session 1 on “Financial inclusion as an engine of inclusive growth”. The representative highlighted the WSBI positions, initiatives and various activities towards achieving greater financial inclusion for the mass market. The conclusions of the Forum will be edited in a book to be published on various platforms.
Financial Inclusion Conference on “Increasing Financial Outreach in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region
At the request of Caisse de Dépots et de Gestion (CDG), one of WSBI’s two member organisations in Morocco, it has been decided to postpone the planned World Savings Day Celebrations that were scheduled to take place in Morocco in 2015 and to be co- hosted with CDG and Al Barid Bank, the other WSBI Moroccan member. Nonetheless it has been decided to proceed with the Financial Inclusion Conference on “Increasing Financial Outreach in the Middle East and
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North Africa (MENA) Region”, which was originally intended to be run back to back with the World Savings Day Celebrations. This will now be run back to back with WSBI’s Annual Postal Savings Banks Forum. Both events will be co–organised with Al Barid Bank and take place in Marrakech, Morocco from 23 – 25 November 2015.
Asia/Pacific
Asia Pacific Regional Group Meeting
The 21st Meeting of the WSBI Asia Regional Group took place in Barcelona, Spain on 13 & 14 April 2015 back to back with the WSBI-CaixaBank Conference on “Innovation in payments at the forefront of retail banking”. The conference constituted the exchange of information and best practice component of the annual Regional Group meeting.
The dedicated session for the Asian members, which took place in the afternoon of 14 April, gathered some 20 representatives from 7 WSBI member institutions and addressed issues that are of specific interest to the Asian region. Some conclusions and highlights include:
- Digitisation and innovation is increasingly prevalent in Asia and non-banking market players are rolling out their financial products and services rapidly in some markets. Accordingly, WSBI members agreed that they need to address this phenomenon as a matter of urgency and to define a digital banking strategy which will enable them to retain their customers, expand market share and find new revenue streams. The business model of the host institution, CaixaBank, is considered as a reference benchmark in this respect.
- Members supported the WSBI institutional message that banking regulation should be proportional rather than ‘one size fits all’.
- As regards financial inclusion, members have developed innovative approaches that are tailored to their market context such as the savings-led microcredit model developed by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), India. Members expressed their willingness to share their expertise for example, NABARD’s microcredit experience, with peers from the WSBI network. WSBI is also encouraged to further promote the business models of its members towards international stakeholders and to organize seminars to exchange know-how, including in the microcredit area.
- Member banks have been actively promoting financial education and some of them are also implementing school banking. Accordingly they welcome the proposed MoU between WSBI and Child and Youth Finance International (CYFI) and look forward to more information on the proposed School Bank project and a coordinated plan of action and communication for Global Money Week as well as some ideas on World Savings Day Celebrations so that WSBI members can assess their interest in participating in these initiatives. It is also highlighted that
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financial education needs a collaborative approach and it is not the responsibility of school and financial institutions only.
- It was noted that WSBI had applied for membership of the IFC managed SME Finance Forum and that membership of individual WSBI members would also be welcomed. SME finance is a priority for traditional savings banks as their microcredit business is up-scaled with the development growth of their customers. Member banks who are not active in SME finance will need to learn expertise from others.
- Members also expressed interest in learning more about the WSBI International Business Network (IBN) platform and how it can be used to facilitate contacts and exchanges between WSBI member banks for their international business. The CaixaBank representative present at the meeting confirmed that this would be very useful and that CaixaBank often had requests for referrals to Asian banks and that this would be a good tool for this purpose.
Representatives highly appreciated the work that Mr Maning, Chief Executive of Bank Simpanan Nasional (BSN) Malaysia, has brought to the Region in the past six years. Mr Maryono, President Director of P. T. Bank Tabungan Negara Indonesia, is appointed as the Chair of the Region from 2015 to 2018.
Asia Pacific Financial Inclusion Summit 2015
WSBI has been invited to moderate a session at the Asia Pacific Financial Inclusion Summit on the overall theme of “Accelerating Financial Inclusion to Enable Economic Progress“, which will take place in Manilla, the Philippines from 27– 29 October 2015. This is a major financial inclusion event which gathers some 500 participants and is sponsored by the Financial Times and Citi Foundation as well as FDC, the Australian funded Foundation for Development Cooperation. WSBI has been invited to moderate a session on “Technology Enabled Asset Building and Preservation” and may also propose one or two WSBI members to participate in this session also. This trip to the Philippines will be combined with visits to members as well as member acquisition activities.
Member of APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) Financial Inclusion working group
WSBI has close interactions with the coordinator of APEC Financial Inclusion Initiative, which was launched by the Finance Minister of APEC countries that aims to promote financial inclusion in the APEC region by helping policymakers obtain deeper understanding of many new developments especially related to the role of technology and innovation, reforms in policies and regulations, increase in diversity and number of stakeholders, and APEC’s role in creating an enabling environment.
The main activity of the APEC Financial Inclusion (FI) Initiative is to organize the annual APEC FI Forum that identifies the key policy issues
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and to report the key recommendations from the Forum to the Finance Ministers. There is an informal working group called the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) Financial Inclusion working group that contribute to the development of APEC FI Forum agenda and the workplan . Regular members of the working group include representatives from CGAP, IFC, APEC Study Center (RMIT University, Australia), etc. WSBI became the ABAC FI working group member in April 2015.
Eastern Europe and Central Asia
Preparations are well under way for the 1st WSBI Event in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, which will be hosted by Belarus Bank and take place in Minsk on 30 September and 1 October 2015. WSBI has managed to attract a number of high-level speakers to this event, including the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation ( IFC), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), high level representatives from the Belarus Government as well as other public and private stakeholders. Representatives of WSBI members BKT Albania, OTP Hungary Şekerbank, Turkey, Amonatbonk, Tajikistan and the German Savings banks Foundation for International Cooperation have also agreed to share their experience on improving SME access to finance and working with international financial institutions with the participants. The challenge is to reach out to banks in the region given the language barrier - effectively all communication has to take place in Russian and involves considerable follow-up before yielding results. Furthermore, some countries in the region, such as Turkmenistan, are effectively cut off from the outside world and everything needs to be channeled through the government. Work is however well underway and we are hoping to achieve respectable participation at the Event.
It is recalled that the objective is to provide a platform to engage stakeholders such as central banks, ministries of finance, regulators, international and regional development banks as well as financial institutions to identify key challenges and opportunities as well as synergies to work together to create an enabling environment in order to boost economic growth and prosperity across the region’s economy and to improve the banking environment. The event will serve to create a platform to bring together WSBI members as well as potential member prospects from Central Asian and Eastern European countries and to identify common interests based on the exchanges of information and best practice at the event.
Latin America and Caribbean Regional Group (GRULAC)
With a view to implementing the WSBI 2020 Strategy, of promoting the WSBI brand in the region and including the GRULAC members have met six times over the last two years in a series of strategic roundtables that have resulted in the identification of two major work streams:
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− generating and sharing knowledge, including organising forums and establishing working/focal groups on specific topics;
− advocacy and interest representation as the global voice of retail banking.
Given that innovation and digitalisation are global phenomena, and have been identified as a primary topic for the GRULAC working group on Innovation for Financial Inclusion, WSBI organised the sixth meeting of the GRULAC Steering Committee, also known as the GRULAC leaders’ strategic roundtable, back-to back with WSBI-CaixaBank’s Innovation in Payments Conference in Barcelona. Overall members took advantage of an interesting programme and high quality speakers during the Conference and benefited from a good scope for networking with other members as well as high-level payments experts. During the GRULAC Steering Committee meeting, members discussed the main take-aways, relevant to their business models and market structure, from the digital banking report drawn up by the WSBI and the GRULAC. Conclusions included the definition of a first set of benchmarks to assess the digital banking readiness of a country, and monitor progress, which regulators and central banks can use to measure bank digitisation across the region. Additionally, the next steps involve gathering an inventory of the barriers to digitization, such as the maturity of the enabling laws for digital banking, the depth of remote access to banking, as well as the overall infrastructure capabilities, that would complement the aforementioned set of indicators.
GRULAC members also supported the creation of a web-based repository, managed by WSBI experts, that systematically collects information on key topics from members from all regions, in line with the online community proposal elaborated with the support of CaixaBank. Finally, members expressed interest in learning more about WSBI’s international field experience with global players. In terms of interaction with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), members decided to switch to a reactive approach and only go to the IDB to request funding on the specific demand of members.
High-level contacts with key stakeholders in Latin America
Chris De Noose has been invited as the sole speaker coming from the industry at the FELABAN annual meetings in the “Financial Inclusion: Challenges and Opportunities for Latin America” panel on 14-17 November 2015 in Miami. The panel will be moderated by CNN news and participants include the Central Bank of Chile and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) –World Bank Group. WSBI participation in the panel is the result of the contacts established with Felaban’s (Federation of Latin American Banks) and FIBA’s (Florida International Bankers) top management, that jointly manage the Felaban annual meetings, during the annual meeting November last year in Medellin. The objective of participation in this panel is to put WSBI on the regional radar, as each
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year the event brings together the major players in the banking sector in the Americas, as well as from other regions, so it is a prime opportunity to profile WSBI not only in the Latin American region, but also with the international banking stakeholders with a presence in Miami.
On 15 June a delegation of WSBI visited the Central American Bank of Economic Integration (CABEI/BCIE) premises in Tegucigalpa, Honduras to establish a first contact and to explore areas of mutual cooperation. CABEI is a development bank for the Central American region and Dominican Republic that finances infrastructure and public-private projects destined to socio-economic development. Given WSBI experience over the years developing know-how and capabilities with respect to banking strategies, digital banking and financial inclusion, possible areas of collaboration could include:
- Promoting and sponsor the Master in Responsible Banking among Central American leaders with the objective to promote a banking management model aimed at sustainability and profitability in the medium and long term – BCIE/CABEI will receive a funding facility for KfW and EU to promote responsible banking in Q3 or Q4 of 2015.
- Exploring partnership possibilities in form of technical assistance / consulting to share best practices in banking and financial inclusion.
- CABEI to support/fund specific or group-wide financial inclusion projects that present components of innovation / high replicability developed by WSBI within entities in Central America and Dominican Republic.
- Conducting a joint forum in Central America on issues of interest in the field of technology and financial opportunities for the majority with funding coming from BCIE/CABEI, and best practices from around the world from WSBI.
WSBI is currently following up with BCIE/CABEI’s alliances department to identify specific joint initiatives.
Microfinance activities
WSBI at the Convening of Stakeholders on MFI industry infrastructure:
At the kind invitation of the center for financial inclusion (CFI), a think tank working toward full global financial inclusion, funders and stakeholders including: Oiko Credit, Triple Jump, WSBI, CEO action Group, CGAP, gathered together in Utrecht on 2 June 2015 to investigate into the business models, budgets, users and sources of funds of the MIX, Microfinance Transparency and rating agencies. The latter are known as key players of the global microfinance industry in charge of raising awareness inside the industry on specific issues (pricing, social performance, etc…) and creating a path forward to best and more ethical practices. However, nowadays these institutions are declining and becoming unattractive to industry stakeholder. As a consequence, for
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instance, Microfinance Transparency has announced the end of its data collection activities, and MIX is facing stiff competition from new companies capturing more and more users.
Discussants globally recognized the urgent need of infrastructure investments to keep the industry sound and ready to cope with the future. Nevertheless, there were no consensus on the identification of the responsible actor to feed and support this infrastructure.
WSBI participates at the E-MPF action group of digital
innovations for financial empowerment (DIFE)
The e-MFP DIFE brings together microfinance and financial inclusion professionals in areas of digital, electronic and mobile finance operations with the objective to identify some relevant digital finance initiatives of e-MPF members and disseminate the lessons learnt from the business model around the world. WSBI has joined the DIFE this year and attended the 3Rd
meeting in Paris on 30th June 2015 on the kind invitation of ACTED (Agence d’Aide à la Cooperation technique).The FINCA Tanzania agency banking model including a mix of three channels: Branches, Agency Banking (FINCA Express) and mobile banking was presented to the members for their observations. The lessons on payment structure, delivery channels, customer awareness education campaign, and risk analysis, were highlighted to participants.
Similarly, WSBI introduced Tanzania Postal Bank’s business model for Village groups (VSLA / VICOBA) including its mobile banking platform. The DIFE members approved the publication of the two cases in the formats of books and digitally by e-MPF on their various platforms. They also agreed to sponsor an evening cocktail at the next e-MPF in November 2015.
Finally, an overview of the digital finance landscape in the MENA Region was presented through axes of regulatory framework, financial & telco sector, payment service providers and Mobile finance service implementations. The next meeting of the DIFE action group is planned take place in September 2015.
WSBI at the Launch of the 6th edition of Microfinance Barometer
The Microfinance Barometer uses the FIDEX data to provide the financial inclusion global trends and figures, enabling to analyze micro finance industry (MFI) key developments and new opportunities in countries North and South. This 6th edition was made by the FNCE (Féderation Nationale des Caisses D’Epargne), MasterCard foundation, Groupe Caisse des Dépots, E-MPF, and Oiko credit and was presented to the public in Paris in the premises of FNCE on 30th June .
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The main outcomes of the barometer is that over 700 million of adults were banked in the last 5 years and the MFI sector is a key contributor to this achievement. Moreover, digitalization is driving this result and southern countries are better in capturing this new development.
Digitalisation
The WSBI 2015 work plan proposed continued support to the worldwide move to digitalisation, particularly relating to mobile banking and promoting partnership models. This takes place mostly in the form of exchanges of information and best practice at all levels in WSBI and in particular at the various WSBI Regional Group Meetings.
One of the main initiatives in this respect during the reference period was the flagship WSBI-CaixaBank Conference on the topic of “Innovation in Payments – At the Forefront of Retail Banking”, which took place in Barcelona on 13 and 14 April 2015. The event focused on the new digital banking landscape, the effect of digitisation on the payments value chain, the transition to a cashless society, P2P payments, and big data analytics in banking. It brought together a diverse, global audience of retail and savings banks from 42 countries (more than 200 participants), indicating the importance of the "new era in payments" to retail and savings banks. Innovations in networking and transactions are central to emerging digital technology, and as payments is a transaction and network industry, it is obviously at the forefront of innovations in digital banking.
The conference was highly appreciated by all participants and both WSBI and CaixaBank have received positive feedback due to the high level of speakers from diverse backgrounds (banks, financial service providers, fintech startups, policy and regulatory stakeholders etc.), the high-quality of content and the smooth organisation. Media coverage of the event was very high – a high number announcements and articles were seen on Spanish TV, radio and the press. A summary of the conference outcomes as well as the programme can be found on the WSBI-ESBG website.
WSBI-ESBG has recognised the good synergies that can be created from partnering with a member that has already developed ground-breaking expertise in a certain field and organising a conference/event together to showcase and exchange best practices on the latest developments in retail banking – this time: innovation/payments/digitalisation theme in coordination with CaixaBank. The Joint Office is considering the continuation of this kind of events every year or every other year on urgent and important banking developments in the field of savings and retail banking – currently innovation is a keyword and core topic.
The proposal of establishing a WSBI-ESBG Online Community as a tool for collaborative innovation based on a concept proposed by CaixaBank that was mentioned in the last progress report is still under review. It will
however form an integral part of a global WSBI- ESBG strategy on Digitalisation and Innovation which is under review at present.
2015 World Savings Day
The Joint Office is planning an event to raise awareness on World Savings Day, which will take place in Brussels on 23 October 2015. This will also be an opportunity for WSBI and ESBG – to tell the savings banks story and weave it into current EU policy debate. The venue will be the Press Club Brussels Europe and we are aiming for an audience of 60-75 persons from amongst policymakers, diplomatic community, members, stakeholders, and, of course, the press.
The format is a ceremony and a debate followed by a buffet lunch. In terms of content, it is proposed to share the tale of World Savings Day and its rich tradition and global reach and tie this in with the savings banks narrative. Finally, we show thought leadership in EU banking policy – the proposed EU Capital Markets Union and how it relates to SMEs. The debate allows us to try and “own” the SME space as it relates to our special role – converting savings into financing that nourishes start-ups and expands small- and medium-size businesses.
In line with the WSBI policy of raising awareness of World Savings Day (WSD) and encouraging more and more WSBI members to use this occasion to promote their brand and their commitment to savings, the WSBI has produced a World Savings Day Toolkit. Members will be encouraged to share information on their World Savings Day celebrations with WSBI, including pictures and video clips, which WSBI will showcase on its website.
Interaction with Child & Youth Finance International
A cooperation agreement between WSBI and Child & Youth Finance International (CYFI) (see Doc 0325/15) also foresees cooperation on a project level. As mentioned earlier, a proof of concept is being carried out with Fedecrédito, the WSBI El Salvadorian member and National Savings Bank, the WSBI member in Sri Lanka). The aim is to increase financial inclusion and education of young people between 6 and 25 years of age through the set-up of SchoolBanks. The project uses innovative distribution channels and technology (mobile application) with the goal of empowering the use of financial services for children and youth in a cost efficient way. Once proven, T&C can rollout the concept to other members.
The meetings of the Regional Groups during the reference period was also the opportunity to highlight the cooperation with CYFI and to encourage them to become involved in the 2016 edition of Global Money Week in
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particular. The 2016 GMW toolkit will be available for distribution to members by the end of September 2015.
5. Implementation of WSBI-ESBG 2012-2015 transformation plan
Adjust the WSBI service offer The Joint Office is continuing to adjust its service offer in accordance with feedback received from the members and in line with the resources available. It is recalled that the top three international policy files (G20) of importance to members are: Financial inclusion, Basel III, Regulatory changes to banking business models towards funding the real economy. The top three international policy files on which non-European WSBI members would like to cooperate with ESBG members are: Financial inclusion, Basel III, Investments in SMEs and start-up business. It should also be noted that there is more and more demand for exchanges of information and best practice at all levels and within all parts of the world, particularly in areas related to innovation.
Membership
The developments concerning membership over the reporting period can be summarised as follows: New Membership applications have been received from:
Afrique Emergence & Investments a micro finance institution from the Cote D’Ivoire as an associate member
It is recalled that an application for membership has already been received from Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), Japan, and an application for WSBI associate membership from Alalay Sa Kaunlaren, INC (ASKI), the Philippines. These applications are to be submitted for approval to the WSBI General Assembly in September 2015.
The main membership acquisition campaign during the reference period was in Central America. In June, WSBI with the support of Fedecrédito (WSBI member in El Salvador) visited not only prospective members, but also existing members, as well as the Development Bank in the region, notably:- Banco Atlántida in Honduras- Central American Bank of Economic Integration- Banco Industrial in Guatemala- Banrural – WSBI member in Guatemala- Grupo Financiero LAFISE in Nicaragua
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- Caja de Ahorros de Panama- Asociación Popular de Ahorros y Préstamos in Dominican Republic- Asociación La Nacional de Ahorros y Préstamos in Dominican
Republic
Meetings also took place with BRAC and AGrani Bank, two potentially interesting membership prospects from Bangledesh on 27 August 2015:
The WSBI Event in Eastern Europe and Central Asia on 30 September and 1 October and the event in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Region at the end of November will also serve to reach out to a large number of potential WSBI member prospects in these two respective region with a view to establishing a dialogue on WSBI membership as well as to re-establish contacts with existing members in the region, particularly those that are not very active.
WSBI has developed a new set of corporate brochures and presentations, also with a focus on the value proposition, to support contacts with prospective members.
Raise Internal standards
The 2015 workplan proposed that initiatives will continue to raise all aspects of staff professionalism, internal processes and systems. The website, launched in June 2014 has continuously developed, both on a technical level and contentwise. The outreach section, with information specifically target on African, Asian and Latin-American members still requires further work. Social media presence (Linkedin, Twitter) has been developed during the reporting period with, especially for Twitter, with very encouraging results.
