Women's World Banking - WWB - Women and Development - Brief Article

WIN News, Spring, 2002

8 West 40th St.

New York, NY 10018

Contact: Nicola Armacost

Fax: (212) 768-8519

e-mail: wwb@swwb.org

website: www.swwb.org

"36 Affiliates in 30 Countries: Africa - 11 countries // Asia - 8 countries // Europe - 5 countries // Latin America and The Caribbean - 15 countries // North America - 1 country.

HISTORY

Women's World Banking (WWB) was conceived during the first United Nation's World Conference on Women held in Mexico City in 1975. At that meeting ten visionary women from five continents found that they had one key belief in common: that economic access for poor women could change the way the world works. Together these women transformed their vision into reality by formally incorporating the organization as a not-for-profit financial institution in the Netherlands in 1979. Today, WWB, a global leader in microfinance, is the only women-led global network that aims to open the world's financial system to low income women.

MISSION AND PRINCIPLES

WWB's mission is to expand low income women's economic assets, participation and power by opening access to finance, information and markets. WWB works to achieve its goal in three ways: by providing and organizing support to affiliates who in turn offer direct services to low income women; by building learning and change networks comprised of leading microfinance institutions and banks; and by working with policy makers to build financial systems that work for the poor majority. In practical terms this means creating the means for a low income woman to build her business, improve her living conditions, keep her family well-fed and healthy, educate her children, develop respect at home and in her community, and secure a political voice.

The WWB global network has a transformational development agenda. All network members operate from shared principles and values. We believe that poor women are dynamic economic agents, not passive beneficiaries of social services, and successful economic development has clients as its focus.

STRUCTURE AND ACTIVITIES

Women's World Banking has become one of the leading institutions in microenterprise financing through: the direct services of affiliates; the reach of associates; WWB-led learning and change networks; partnerships with governments, banks and international funders in building national financial systems and global support that work for the majority.

WWB AFFILIATES

At the core of WWB is the network of 40 affiliates and affiliates-in-formation in 34 countries of Asia, Africa, Latin America, Europe and North America. These are women-led organizations that provide lending, savings and/or business development services to over 400,000 low income women entrepreneurs around the world. . . To become an affiliate of WWB an organization needs to state its commitment to the mission and principles of the network, it must be women-led, and it must meet other minimum eligibility criteria. Each affiliate is an independent, legally established, local entity. At the global level, affiliates of WWB receive and participate in the delivery of services geared to strengthening the scale, efficiency, sustainability and impact of affiliate operations. . .

WWB ASSOCIATES

Associates do not receive direct services from WWB; they participate in the service delivery, knowledge building and policy change initiatives of the WWB network. . .

The Africa Microfinance Network (AFMIN) is a newly established regional association of country-level microfinance networks in Africa that has the status of an international non-governmental organization. In April 2001, WWB launched the Global Network for Banking Innovation (GNBI), comprised of 21 leading retail and wholesale financial institutions that are showing that microfinance is a profitable and transformational business opportunity. . .

Since 1994, WWB has been the Secretariat of the International Coalition on Women and Credit, which includes microfinance networks and retail financial institutions. From 1994 to 1996 the focus of the Coalition was to ensure that the issues of poor women as economic agents and clients of financial services were central to major UN and other global forums. Since 1997, the focus has been on building poor women's voice in the institutions that serve them and in shaping policies that affect them

WWB GLOBAL TEAM AND NETWORK SERVICES

The WWB global office, based in New York, serves as a communications hub and service center for the affiliate network. A team of 42 individuals from 29 countries, provides institutional development programs, financial services, business development services, policy initiatives, and more. . ."