Visa and GSMA launch digital finance for all initiatives

Visa and the GSMA Foundation announced the launch of the Digital Finance for All (DFA) Initiative, furthering Visa’s efforts to increase access to the global economy for everyone, everywhere. This five-year initiative aims to advance digital financial inclusion for 20 million individuals, including women, small holder farmers (SHF), and nano, micro, and small enterprise (NMSE) owners across low- and middle-income countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

Barriers to digital economy access persist for marginalised groups

While digital payments use by adults in low- and middle-income countries is up 66% from 2014, women, SHFs, NMSE owners, and globally displaced individuals continue to face barriers accessing the digital economy. Women in low- and middle-income countries are 20% less likely than men to hold a formal financial account and more than 30% of the world’s food is produced by SHFs yet most have limited or no access to formal financial services like credit, loans, savings, or insurance.

To help improve financial health, the DFA will:

• Deliver financial education resources through a jointly developed mobile financial literacy toolkit that enables easy delivery and scaling across markets to help enable successful access to and participation in mobile money services;

• Develop joint research through the Visa Economic Empowerment Institute (VEEI) and the GSMA Foundation focused on financial inclusion, advocacy, and product innovation for women, SHFs, NMSEs, and globally displaced individuals;

• Digitise SHFs and NMSEs to support their adoption of digital financial services to enable their resilience and growth; 

• Support meaningful financial inclusion and wellbeing for refugees and the communities who host them.

Representatives from the GSMA Foundation explained that mobile money can play a transformative role in advancing financial inclusion and resilience for the nearly 2 billion people who remain unbanked globally. However, poor digital and financial literacy is a key barrier to accessing digital financial services, especially for certain population segments like women, farmers, and micro-merchants. They are happy about their partnership with Visa enabling them to further drive economic empowerment and support millions of users to access life changing financial services.

What does GSMA Mobile for Development Foundation do?

The GSMA Mobile for Development Foundation brings together mobile operators, innovators, governments, and the international development community to realise the positive social, economic, and climate impact of mobile technology, primarily in low- and middle-income countries. With funding from donors and the GSMA, the GSMA Foundation runs programmes that advance digital and financial inclusion – with a strong focus on gender inclusivity, climate action, humanitarian response, and investment in innovative digital solutions. Since 2007, these programmes have impacted the lives of over 220 million people.