As Sub-Saharan Africa recovers from the economic and social impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, investing in sustainable and scalable solutions to women’s economic empowerment presents a critical opportunity to ‘build back better’.

CGAP’s three-year project on Digital Financial Services (DFS) Distribution Networks sought to enable key stakeholders in six focus countries (Indonesia, India, Pakistan, Morocco, Cote d’Ivoire, Colombia) to leverage existing knowledge about Cash-in and Cash-out (CICO) networks in rural areas, where most of the financially excluded people still live, with a view to enabling more rural customers to access and use digital financial services.

The period of late adolescence and early adulthood is a significant one, which profoundly influences future potential.

Adolescent girls often experience significant barriers to economic empowerment due to social norms which limit their power to make and act on economic decisions in order to enhance their broader well-being and position in society.

The “Women and Money” programme, implemented by IDEO.org, has begun to answer “the how” of introducing Digital Financial Services (DFS) into the lives of women: how to build trust with them; how to encourage them access to digital financial services; and how accounts and payments can have a positive impact on their lives.

The Asia Foundation in Mongolia is implementing a four year project to increase women’s economic empowerment in Mongolia through supporting women-led CSOs. Kore Global has been working with TAF Mongolia since the inception of this project to help strengthen the GESI and MERL aspects of this project.

Kore Global worked together with The Global Centre for Gender Equality at Stanford University (under a Gates Foundation grant) in 2019 and 2020 to conduct an extensive study on women’s economic empowerment policies, programs, research and data in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.