The Small Firm Diaries is a global research initiative to better understand small firms in low-income neighborhoods of developing countries, especially the barriers to growth such firms face, through high frequency quantitative and qualitative data collection (“financial diaries”).

This publication focuses on promoting meso-level insurance products designed for development banks, microfinance institutions, provident/pension funds, associations, and cooperatives through the UNCDF-led Pacific Insurance and Climate Adaptation Programme.

Based on 3,822 (majority women) VSLA member interviews, this brief represents quantitative data from Burundi, Colombia, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Mali, Niger, and Vietnam.

This report examines challenges associated with access to affordable and suitable insurance for low- and moderate-income communities, risks, and coping mechanisms and identifies unaddressed issues.

This paper evaluates the gendered impact of an index-based livestock insurance product on food consumption among pastoral households in southern Ethiopia.

This episode features Women’s Micro Bank, a women-owned bank in Papua New Guinea that pushed geographical and technological boundaries in its attempts to expand women’s access to banking services.

The purpose of this study is to foster a conversation between stakeholders of agri SME-finance for affirming proven approaches and identifying new ones to overcome agri finance barriers.

Given the urgency of digital transformation to build an inclusive recovery, this paper provides timely insights into how to enable supply chain finance models in three African countries.

This study examines Women's Micro Bank Limited and UNCDF's design of a branchless banking solution, the Mama Bank Access Point initiative, which serves unbanked women in rural Papua New Guinea. 

This report describes PICAP’s approach towards achieving and mainstreaming gender equality and social inclusion to ensure that women and the most vulnerable are fully represented in climate disaster risk financing products (e.g., parametric insurance).