Aimed at addressing the key challenge of inaccessibility to the poor faced by the microfinance industry across the globe, this unique public-private partnership between PPO and FMFB was initiated in 2008 and has allowed for rapid scaling up of quality microfinance services to the very poor populations residing in remote rural and urban areas of Pakistan.
Hussain Tejany, President, FMFB, and Ghulam Panjtan Rizvi, Additional Director General Financial Services, Pakistan Post signed the agreement for reaching out to the poor segment of the country particularly in the rural unbanked areas of Sindh and Punjab, under the approval of the State Bank of Pakistan. Muhammad Ahmed Mian, Director General Pakistan Post and Federal Secretary Pakistan Post was also present on the occasion.
"Our partnership with the Pakistan Post, which has an extensive network of sub offices (SO) across Pakistan, has enabled FMFB to reach out to the remote and vulnerable poor by providing microfinance services through 68 PPO Sub Offices in Southern Punjab, Central Punjab, Upper Sindh and Lower Sindh regions, disbursing over 88,000 loans amounting to PKR 1.3 billion across the country in 2009" said Hussain Tejany, President FMFB.
Given that 71 per cent of the poor in Pakistan are women, about 21 per cent of loans disbursed were to women entrepreneurs. He added, "the Bank has also been able to maintain the quality of ifs portfolio through the SO network, which has given us the confidence to take this partnership forward and expand our operations through the PPO network in the next three years. Our areas of intervention will continue to be the poverty focused areas of Sindh and Punjab".
This unique public-private partnership has marked a major breakthrough in the microfinance sector and is bringing The FMFB Ltd closer to ifs clientele, while Pakistan Post benefits from optimum utilisation and development of its resources, including human capital. The FMFB Ltd a part of the Aga Khan Agency for Microfinance (AKAM), is a premier, non-commercial, private sector Microfinance Bank licensed by the State Bank of Pakistan. FMFB has been ranked as 7th among the top 100 Micro-finance Institutions of the world by the World Bank affiliate, CGAP.
FMFB strives to alleviate poverty through sustainable economic development by offering credit, savings and life insurance services along with an efficient and low cost funds transfer service to its target populations. With over 157 locations, including 89 automated branches all over Pakistan and access to 68 Pakistan Post outlets, FMFB has disbursed over PKR 12 billion ($142 million) through 677,000 loans while generating a deposit base of PKR 5.2 billion ($61.9 million) as in December 2009.-PR