The Microfinance India Summit, 2010

A national initiative of ACCESS, dedicated to address the relevant themes in Micro finance

The Microfinance India Summit, the pan-India flagship initiative of ACCESS, has become the most significant platform to bring the sector together for envisioning the future. Over the last six years, the Microfinance India Summit has established itself as an international conference dedicated over the subject of Indian microfinance.

It has become the single most important platform for sharing the unique Indian experience with the global audience. At the same time, it also provides an avenue to learn about international trends and practices for adaptation by the Indian community of practitioners. Policy makers, practitioners, promoters, academics, researchers and thought leaders share their experiences on various panels, and about 1,000 delegates from both the country and outside participate in the Summit. It strives to bridge the unnecessary hiatus between models and methodologies and helps to build consensus on the critical challenges and issues.

The seventh Microfinance India Summit was organized this year from the 15th of November till the 16th at the Hotel Ashok, New Delhi. An over-arching theme for this year’s Summit was "Mission of Microfinance - Need to Reflect and Reaffirm". The Summit sessions focused on the current trends and issues relating to sustainability, transparency, social performance, commercialization of the sector, client protection, among others. As in other years, the Summit received a very encouraging response, with a participation of over 1,000 people including 89 resource persons (speakers) spread across 17 sessions.

Special addresses were given by Mr Pieter Bult, Deputy Country Director, UNDP India and Mr U. C. Sarangi, Chairman, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), followed by the key note addresses delivered by Dr. C. Rangarajan, Chairman, Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister and Mr. R. Gopalan, Secretary, Department of Financial Services, Government of India. As a part of the Microfinance India Summit 2010, the following associated sub-events have been undertaken:

The Knowledge Fair, showcasing various related products and services offered by stakeholders in the sector is organized during the summit. Stakeholders from the microfinance sector including NABARD, SIDBI, State Bank of India, Hindustan Unilever Limited, Atom Technologies, FINO, Gradatim, among others were part of this Knowledge Fair.

Thematic Roundtables involving organizations / institutions which seek to raise the issues for debates and discussions, present findings of recent research, share innovative ideas or hold consultative workshops. Six such thematic roundtables were held, viz., Affordable Housing Finance (International Finance Corporation), Championing Gender Diversity for Microfinance (Women’s World Banking), Relevance of Gold as a Long Term Savings Instrument (World Gold Council), Youth Inclusive Financial Services (SEEP Network, Making Cents International), Responsible Pricing: The State of Practice (Smart Campaign (ACCION International)) and Reaching the Unreached: Client Education and Micro-Insurance (CARE India).

The Knowledge Fair, showcasing various related products and services offered by stakeholders in the sector is organized during the summit. Stakeholders from the microfinance sector including NABARD, SIDBI, State Bank of India, Hindustan Unilever Limited, Atom Technologies, FINO, Gradatim, among others were part of this Knowledge Fair.

Thematic Roundtables involving organizations / institutions which seek to raise the issues for debates and discussions, present findings of recent research, share innovative ideas or hold consultative workshops. Six such thematic roundtables were held, viz., Affordable Housing Finance (International Finance Corporation), Championing Gender Diversity for Microfinance (Women’s World Banking), Relevance of Gold as a Long Term Savings Instrument (World Gold Council), Youth Inclusive Financial Services (SEEP Network, Making Cents International), Responsible Pricing: The State of Practice (Smart Campaign (ACCION International)) and Reaching the Unreached: Client Education and Micro-Insurance (CARE India).

State of the Sector Report

As a part of the Microfinance India Summit, an important annual initiative is to bring out the “Microfinance in India – A State of the Sector Report”. This is an annual publication that aims to present in-depth, researched and well analyzed evidence on how the sector has been growing. The Report provides updated data relating up scaling of delivery models, new investments and innovations, and perspectives on current issues, and highlights knowledge gaps that require further research and statistical analysis. It also highlights and presents perspectives on current issues and to document new interest, new investments and innovations in the sector. It also identifies knowledge gaps that require further research and statistical efforts. In addition to being an important reference document for practitioners, researchers, investors, resource agencies etc, this report is also crucial for external stakeholders in order for them to better understand the full complexity and the various nuances within the sector.

The fifth Microfinance State of the Sector report, authored by N Srinivasan, with support from ACCESS team, was released during the Summit this year. The State of the Sector report 2010, in addition to providing updates on various growth indicators, deals with issues of savings, valuations, competition, social performance and the global context.

The Microfinance India Awards

The inspiration behind the Microfinance India Awards is to construct a mechanism in order to recognize the larger contributions of several thought leaders, practitioners, policy makers, promoters and researchers to this sector. The Awards were instituted by ACCESS in 2009 and have since been sponsored by HSBC in India to honor specific individuals and institutions that have shown exemplary commitment towards promoting the cause of financial inclusion and have made significant contribution to the growth of the microfinance sector. The focus of these awards is both on individuals and institutions who have contributed to the up scaling of microfinance in India.

Microfinance India MFI of the Year Award

This award seeks to recognise pioneering thoughts or product leadership or best practices followed by an institution. Representative parameters for growth achieved, potential to upscale operations and process/ product / technological innovation towards achieving financial inclusion are some of the important considerations. There are two sub-categories within this institutional category to provide sufficient representation to MFIs with varying portfolio size and outreach:

1. Microfinance India MFI of the Year Award for large MFIs
2. Microfinance India MFI of the Year Award for small and medium MFIs

Microfinance India Contribution to the Sector by Enabling Institutions

This Award seeks to recognize institutions which have contributed in building the microfinance sector and supported it to become a part of the mainstream financial sector. Contributions could be in the form of capacity building services, ratings, provision or arrangement of equity/debt capital, policy advocacy for recognition and efficient regulation of the microfinance sector, assisting social performance management, and promoting financial inclusion.

Microfinance India Contribution to the Sector by Individual

This is a lifetime achievement award to honour long-term, significant contributions of an individual on issues in the microfinance sector. This Award will recognise the dedication of the professional to the sector that is above and beyond the immediate realm of his/her organisation through active involvement in influencing policy interventions and sector building efforts.

An independent Jury was appointed in consultation with the HSBC team members and the Advisory Board for the Summit. The Jury comprised of:

The winners of the Microfinance India Awards, 2010 are as follows:

Category	Awardees
Microfinance India Institution of the Year 2010 (Large MFI)	Shri Kshethra Dharmasthala Rural Development Project (SKDRDP)
Microfinance India Institution of the Year 2010 (Small and Medium MFI)	Arohan Financial Services Pvt. Ltd.
Microfinance India Contribution to the Sector 2010 (Enabling Institution)	Friends of Women’s World Banking (FWWB) India
Microfinance India Contribution to the Sector 2010 (Individual)	Aloysius P. Fernandez
Jury’s Special Award for Lifetime Achievement	Ela Bhatt

State Visioning for Microfinance

This is an initiative of Microfinance India Platform to respond to regional skew issues in Indian microfinance. This ACCESS initiative identifies one or two states in the underserved regions and attempts to bring together all stakeholders to help a vision for the state. The aim of this initiative is to take stock of the financial, human and institutional resources that are required to support the sector in the state.

The vision helps in identifying gaps in the sector, helps in greater clarity in roles and responsibilities of different stakeholders, helps in resource planning, resource optimization and resource pooling. It also helps in establishing benchmarks related to growth and helps in tracking progress. This process is an attempt to bring greater local ownership in the sector up scaling efforts. The output of this initiative is a well analyzed vision document that clearly outlines a pathway for sector activities in the state. In the past, we have developed vision documents for Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan. Continuing with our mandate, we conducted state visioning exercise for the North East Region (NER) in 2010. Based on the challenges of limited growth of the microfinance sector (SHPIs and MFIs), presence of local / indigenous institutions, poor infrastructure, hilly terrain, low population density, insurgency, natural calamities in the NER, some of the strategies suggested were (i) multiple delivery channels (SHG, MFI, Indigenous institutions, BC) need to be explored; (ii) nurture new MFIs and encourage existing MFIs to partner with NGOs/SHPIs to reach remote and underserved areas; (iii) focus on creating a conducive environment for consolidation of MFI operations rather than on scaling up; (iv) funds for capacity building of SHPIs and MFIs need to be provided by apex institutions like SIDBI, NABARD, NEDFi, DONER, among others; (v) leverage Government schemes; among others. These strategies were developed in consultation and discussions with the microfinance stakeholders including financial institutions, practitioners, academicians, capacity building institutions in different states of the NER.

Policy Retreats

Another significant sub-initiative of ACCESS’ Microfinance India is to organize the thematic policy retreats. These retreats are based on issues that have arisen during the Microfinance India Summit. A small group of policy-makers and thought leaders dwell on one specific theme during these retreats. In 2010, ACCESS in coordination with UNDP India and MFIN organized a policy retreat on ‘Client Protection in Indian Microfinance’. Key focus of the retreat was to delve on issues in client protection, identify current efforts and initiatives to address these and challenges faced by MFIs in translating principles into practice and agree on a way forward for the sector on furthering this agenda. While the discussions in the retreat provided a platform for stakeholders including MFIs, associations, resource agencies and support institutions to exchange strategies, ideas and concerns, the report was shared with wider set of stakeholders.