Energizing Microfinance Workshop Documentation - Revision history

Wiki Gardener: /* Pilot Phase & Implementation */

2014-11-10T07:03:32Z

Pilot Phase & Implementation

Wiki Gardener at 07:01, 10 November 2014

2014-11-10T07:01:05Z

Ranisha at 10:20, 16 July 2014

2014-07-16T10:20:58Z

Fungai Cecilia Sandamu at 12:05, 24 April 2013

2013-04-24T12:05:00Z

Show changes

Katharina Wiedemann at 08:43, 19 October 2012

2012-10-19T08:43:22Z

Show changes

Benjamin Rebenich at 15:18, 8 February 2012

2012-02-08T15:18:54Z

Natalia Realpe Carrillo at 10:47, 20 May 2011

2011-05-20T10:47:19Z

Klara at 09:33, 17 May 2011

2011-05-17T09:33:52Z

Klara at 18:50, 5 May 2011

2011-05-05T18:50:11Z

Klara at 18:49, 5 May 2011

2011-05-05T18:49:43Z

@@ Line 70: / Line 70: @@
 <br/>
 == Pilot Phase & Implementation ==
@@ Line 83: / Line 84: @@
 A new problem for the MFI integrating an energy portfolio is the need for additional end-user training in this field. Participatory training methods proved to be more appropriate in order to encourage participants to ask questions. Experiences from Kenya have shown that an internal "energy department" within the MFI is very useful to build capacities of such additional activities, in order to identify and solve potential problems before they arise.
-Lastly, microfinanced energy projects are complex and always involve several stakeholders. To avoid too much conflicts, it is worth to elaborate detailed and clear Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) and to rediscuss the different roles and responsibilities in regular intervals.
+Lastly, microfinanced energy projects are complex and always involve several stakeholders. To avoid too much conflicts, it is worth to elaborate detailed and clear '''Memoranda of Understanding (MoU)''' and to rediscuss the different roles and responsibilities in regular intervals.
 <br/>
 == Scaling Up & Replication ==

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-= Overview<br/> =
+= Overview =
-Summary of the practitioners’ workshop held in Berlin on April 6, 2011.
+To support the development of projects that interlink energy provision and [[Microfinance|microfinance]], the meeting brought together selected experts and practitioners and allowed them to share experiences, discuss lessons learned and define crucial framework conditions in a closed session.
 = Background<br/> =
@@ Line 12: / Line 14: @@
 The organizations that took part in the workshop came with varied experiences in the development of energy loan projects. To build a common ground for the moderated discussion, a typical project lifecycle was chosen, starting at the point of partner identification and mobilization, going through the preliminary business plan, the pilot and implementation phase and ending with project scale-up and replication procedures.
-[[File:Typical Project Cycle.png|center|869px|Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle|alt=Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle]]
+[[File:Typical Project Cycle.png|thumb|center|869px|Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle|alt=Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle]]
-<p style="text-align: center">Figure 1 Typical Project Cycle</p>
 <br/>Applied approaches, common challenges and recommendations from the field have been collected for various stages of the project lifecycle. Carbon finance has been a popular topic lately as a potential matching tool for such projects, and therefore a score of issues as well as opportunities associated with carbon-offset strategies were specifically addressed. As the gathering was also a preparatory working group for the adjacent conference “International Conference on Micro Perspectives for Decentralized Energy Supply“, a primary aim was to identify crucial research gaps and the role that research and education could play in developing solutions.<br/>A synthesis of the workshop results is described below. The complete minutes of the meeting can be made available upon request.
@@ Line 22: / Line 24: @@
 == Partner Identification<br/> ==
-To begin, the business approach needs to be defined. The project origin can be a non-governmental or governmental proposal, a contract with a microfinance institution (MFI) or a collaboration with funding partners. The first activity is to identify project partners: technology and service providers, local academic networks, funders and MFIs. The discussion revealed that a standard selection process is seldom applied – eventhough rating systems already exist in the microfinance sector, decision criteria depends heavily on the local setting. Of paramount importance for collaboration with an MFI is firstly the commitment of the upper management and secondly a so-called “internal champion”, a close working partner within the institution that strongly supports the project.
+To begin, the business approach needs to be defined. The project origin can be a non-governmental or governmental proposal, a contract with a '''microfinance institution (MFI)''' or a collaboration with funding partners. The first activity is to identify project partners: technology and service providers, local academic networks, funders and MFIs. The discussion revealed that a standard selection process is seldom applied – eventhough rating systems already exist in the microfinance sector, decision criteria depends heavily on the local setting. Of paramount importance for collaboration with an MFI is firstly the commitment of the upper management and secondly a so-called “internal champion”, a close working partner within the institution that strongly supports the project.
 <br/>
-{| style="width: 700px; width: 100%" border="1" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1"
+{| cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1" style="width: 700px;  width: 100%"
 |-
 | <u>Partner Identification – Project Examples</u><br/>
@@ Line 47: / Line 49: @@
 <br/>
-One proposition was to think more broadly in terms of end-user financing and consider farmer unions, savings and credit cooperatives (SACCOs), energy enterprises or local businesses as financial intermediaries as well.<br/>When it comes to the technical planning and implementation of energy loan projects, finding the right technical provider was agreed to be the most difficult challenge. Technology companies can be found in almost every country, but the majority maintain their offices in big cities and are not willing to service rural areas. In Senegal for example, SIDI had to create their own company to get the products to the customer as all solar retailers reside in Dakar.<br/>Concerning the inclusion of carbon finance into the project lifecycle strategy, the highest upfront barrier proves to be the initial cost. While it is possible to obtain refunded credits for up to 2 years, the refund period starts at the moment the project is officially listed as a carbon offset venture with the mutual consent of all stakeholders. The Swiss NGO myclimate claims that carbon money can facilitate a number of objectives – improved infrastructure on a long-term basis, project-based technology transfer and increased efficiency. For this reason, carbon finance tends to attract a lot of interested partners, but not necessarily partners with expertise. It remains difficult to identify someone who can assure the necessary monitoring process for the entire project duration.
+One proposition was to think more broadly in terms of end-user financing and consider farmer unions, '''savings and credit cooperatives (SACCOs)''', energy enterprises or local businesses as financial intermediaries as well.<br/>When it comes to the technical planning and implementation of energy loan projects, finding the right technical provider was agreed to be the most difficult challenge. Technology companies can be found in almost every country, but the majority maintain their offices in big cities and are not willing to service rural areas. In Senegal for example, SIDI had to create their own company to get the products to the customer as all solar retailers reside in Dakar.<br/>Concerning the inclusion of carbon finance into the project lifecycle strategy, the highest upfront barrier proves to be the initial cost. While it is possible to obtain refunded credits for up to 2 years, the refund period starts at the moment the project is officially listed as a carbon offset venture with the mutual consent of all stakeholders. The Swiss NGO myclimate claims that carbon money can facilitate a number of objectives – improved infrastructure on a long-term basis, project-based technology transfer and increased efficiency. For this reason, carbon finance tends to attract a lot of interested partners, but not necessarily partners with expertise. It remains difficult to identify someone who can assure the necessary monitoring process for the entire project duration.
 Another hurdle is the requirement of additionality - in order to be eligible for carbon credits, it must be proven that project implementation would not be possible without carbon finance. Two justifications were identified during the discussion: the first argument is to state that a scale-up would only be possible with the support of continous carbon finance, and the second is to be able to extend the project to even more impoverished target groups, a justification that works especially well for MFIs committed to poverty reduction.
@@ Line 65: / Line 67: @@
 The experts agreed that most MFIs need incentives to take on an energy project. Small financial incentives may suffice as risk capital insurance for experimentation and innovation, and to have funds in place for stock, marketing and training. To encourage MFI mobilization, it was recommended to invite decision makers to nearby villages where some of the proposed products have already been applied and can serve as successful examples. Another method could be to inform the MFI of other partners that would be more willing to work with them, e.g. internationally renowned funding sources such as the European Union.
-Examples from Bangladesh and Nepal have shown that subsidy schemes for service and maintenance increase the sustainability of a project immensely, especially if rural areas are targeted. The inclusion of carbon finance into the business case at an early stage offers a regular cash flow once the project enters a mature stage. Worries about the discontinuation of the CDM methodology after the year 2012 were dispelled by myclimate, which sees an evolving demand for carbon offsetting in the voluntary market.
+Examples from [[Bangladesh_Energy_Situation|Bangladesh]] and [[Nepal_Energy_Situation|Nepal]] have shown that subsidy schemes for service and maintenance increase the sustainability of a project immensely, especially if rural areas are targeted. The inclusion of carbon finance into the business case at an early stage offers a regular cash flow once the project enters a mature stage. Worries about the discontinuation of the CDM methodology after the year 2012 were dispelled by myclimate, which sees an evolving demand for carbon offsetting in the voluntary market.
 <br/>
@@ Line 79: / Line 81: @@
 However, experience reveal that the high upfront costs of appropriate energy products are only a part of the financing problem. The development and entertainment of service infrastructure is a cost factor which is often neglacted and under-estimated. Directing subsidies in this field might be a more sustainable solution on the longer term.
-A new problem for the MFI integrating an energy portfolio is the need for additional end-user training in this field. Participatory training methods proved to be more appropriate in order to encourage participants to ask questions. Experiences from Kenya have shown that an internal "energy department" within the MFI is very useful to build capacities of such additional activities, in order to identify and solve potential problems before they arise.&lt;span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);" /&gt;
+A new problem for the MFI integrating an energy portfolio is the need for additional end-user training in this field. Participatory training methods proved to be more appropriate in order to encourage participants to ask questions. Experiences from Kenya have shown that an internal "energy department" within the MFI is very useful to build capacities of such additional activities, in order to identify and solve potential problems before they arise.
 Lastly, microfinanced energy projects are complex and always involve several stakeholders. To avoid too much conflicts, it is worth to elaborate detailed and clear Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) and to rediscuss the different roles and responsibilities in regular intervals.
@@ Line 89: / Line 91: @@
 The long-term goal of a project is to implement the business plan successfully and expand both clientele and product range. Replication strategies may include new MFIs partners, new regions or even new countries to apply the business case.
-Unfortunately, it is not easy to apply small scale methods to large scale applications. Experience from Uganda has shown that a big problem arises once the MFI and the supplier do not grow at a similar rate. It was discussed whether this is the reason why one-handed models, in which both the technical and the financial activities remain under one umbrella (e.g. Grameen Shakti in [[Bangladesh_Energy_Situation|Bangladesh]]), provide the only real success stories so far. Another approach is to de-skill the technical process at the last mile as much as possible to enable collaboration with regular technicians present in the area.
+Unfortunately, it is not easy to apply small scale methods to large scale applications. Experience from Uganda has shown that a big problem arises once the MFI and the supplier do not grow at a similar rate. It was discussed whether this is the reason why one-handed models, in which both the technical and the financial activities remain under one umbrella (e.g. Grameen Shakti in [[Bangladesh Energy Situation|Bangladesh]]), provide the only real success stories so far. Another approach is to de-skill the technical process at the last mile as much as possible to enable collaboration with regular technicians present in the area.
 While some argued that it is the "human factor" in a project which makes it so hard to scale up, the practitioners agreed that lessons learned, especially about things that went wrong, are useful for other projects, eventhough their conditions might be different.
-A good example for a decentralized up-scale was the "innovations unit" at SELCO [[India_Energy_Situation|India]], which searches for smart energy entrepreneurs and supports them through the provision of proper tools, skills and working capital.
+A good example for a decentralized up-scale was the "innovations unit" at SELCO [[India Energy Situation|India]], which searches for smart energy entrepreneurs and supports them through the provision of proper tools, skills and working capital.
 Scaling up and replication phases promise the most benefits for utilizing carbon finance. Projects can be bundled under a so-called Programme of Activities (PoA) and then replicated and getting funding for as long as 28 years.
@@ Line 115: / Line 117: @@
 <br/>
-[[File:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg|center|350px|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg|alt=Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]]
+[[File:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg|thumb|center|350px|Picture MF&E Workshop|alt=Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]]
 <p style="text-align: center">(Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: [http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB flic.kr])</p>
 [[Category:Conference_Documentation]]

@@ Line 4: / Line 4: @@
 Summary of the practitioners’ workshop held in Berlin on April 6, 2011.
-'''To support the development of projects that interlink energy provision and microfinance, the meeting brought together selected experts and practitioners and allowed them to share experiences, discuss lessons learned and define crucial framework conditions in a closed session.'''
+'''To support the development of projects that interlink energy provision and [[Microfinance|microfinance]], the meeting brought together selected experts and practitioners and allowed them to share experiences, discuss lessons learned and define crucial framework conditions in a closed session.'''
 <br/>
@@ Line 12: / Line 12: @@
 The organizations that took part in the workshop came with varied experiences in the development of energy loan projects. To build a common ground for the moderated discussion, a typical project lifecycle was chosen, starting at the point of partner identification and mobilization, going through the preliminary business plan, the pilot and implementation phase and ending with project scale-up and replication procedures.
-[[File:Typical Project Cycle.png|center|Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle|alt=Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle]]
+[[File:Typical Project Cycle.png|center|869px|Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle|alt=Figure 1 - Typical Project Cycle]]
 <p style="text-align: center">Figure 1 Typical Project Cycle</p>
 <br/>Applied approaches, common challenges and recommendations from the field have been collected for various stages of the project lifecycle. Carbon finance has been a popular topic lately as a potential matching tool for such projects, and therefore a score of issues as well as opportunities associated with carbon-offset strategies were specifically addressed. As the gathering was also a preparatory working group for the adjacent conference “International Conference on Micro Perspectives for Decentralized Energy Supply“, a primary aim was to identify crucial research gaps and the role that research and education could play in developing solutions.<br/>A synthesis of the workshop results is described below. The complete minutes of the meeting can be made available upon request.
@@ Line 89: / Line 89: @@
 The long-term goal of a project is to implement the business plan successfully and expand both clientele and product range. Replication strategies may include new MFIs partners, new regions or even new countries to apply the business case.
-Unfortunately, it is not easy to apply small scale methods to large scale applications. Experience from Uganda has shown that a big problem arises once the MFI and the supplier do not grow at a similar rate. It was discussed whether this is the reason why one-handed models, in which both the technical and the financial activities remain under one umbrella (e.g. Grameen Shakti in Bangladesh), provide the only real success stories so far. Another approach is to de-skill the technical process at the last mile as much as possible to enable collaboration with regular technicians present in the area.
+Unfortunately, it is not easy to apply small scale methods to large scale applications. Experience from Uganda has shown that a big problem arises once the MFI and the supplier do not grow at a similar rate. It was discussed whether this is the reason why one-handed models, in which both the technical and the financial activities remain under one umbrella (e.g. Grameen Shakti in [[Bangladesh_Energy_Situation|Bangladesh]]), provide the only real success stories so far. Another approach is to de-skill the technical process at the last mile as much as possible to enable collaboration with regular technicians present in the area.
 While some argued that it is the "human factor" in a project which makes it so hard to scale up, the practitioners agreed that lessons learned, especially about things that went wrong, are useful for other projects, eventhough their conditions might be different.
-A good example for a decentralized up-scale was the "innovations unit" at SELCO India, which searches for smart energy entrepreneurs and supports them through the provision of proper tools, skills and working capital.
+A good example for a decentralized up-scale was the "innovations unit" at SELCO [[India_Energy_Situation|India]], which searches for smart energy entrepreneurs and supports them through the provision of proper tools, skills and working capital.
 Scaling up and replication phases promise the most benefits for utilizing carbon finance. Projects can be bundled under a so-called Programme of Activities (PoA) and then replicated and getting funding for as long as 28 years.
@@ Line 118: / Line 118: @@
 <p style="text-align: center">(Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: [http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB flic.kr])</p>
 [[Category:Financing_and_Funding]]

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:18, 8 February 2012
Line 100:		Line 100:
	[[Image:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg\|center\|350px\|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]](Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB)<br>		[[Image:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg\|center\|350px\|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]](Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB)<br>

		+	[[Category:Financing,_promotion_schemes_and_subsidies]]
	[[Category:Workshop_Substance]]		[[Category:Workshop_Substance]]

@@ Line 26: / Line 26: @@
 *New constitution of a technical provider as there were none previously existing&lt;span style="font-weight: bold;" /&gt;
-'''2) Top down: Microenergy International (MEI) in Peru'''<br>
+'''2) Top down: MicroEnergy International (MEI) in Peru'''<br>
 *Criteria for selecting target region: energy potential &amp; microfinance market maturity
@@ Line 32: / Line 32: @@
 *Identification of 3 partner MFIs through this process
-'''3) "Go with the flow": Planet Finance in China'''<br>
+'''3) "Go with the flow": PlaNet Finance in China'''<br>
 *Collaboration with government crucial – be active where subsidies are available (e.g. for household biogas)

@@ Line 91: / Line 91: @@
 Strong synergies between carbon finance and microfinance are seen in the following activities:
-*financing different project phases - carbon finance really kicks in after the pilote phase when projects scale up and infrastructure costs become relevant in order to replicate.
+*Financing different project phases - carbon finance really kicks in after the pilote phase when projects scale up and infrastructure costs become relevant in order to replicate.
-*monitoring - regulare collection of payments and their monitoring through MFIs has strong synergies with the monitoring requirements of carbon finance programs. This monitoring can even be financed by carbon credits.<br>
+*Monitoring - regular collection of payments and their monitoring through MFIs has strong synergies with the monitoring requirements of carbon finance programs. This monitoring can even be financed by carbon credits.<br>
-*standardization - The microfinance industry and the carbon finance industry both require a high level of standardization in order to scale up. This bears further synergies of combining these approachs.
+*Standardization - The microfinance industry and the carbon finance industry both require a high level of standardization in order to scale up. This bears further synergies of combining these approaches.
 *Additionality of carbon $$ - In order to become eligible for carbon finance, projects generally have to prove that they use the money for activities which would not be profitable without these funds. This is often the case if service and maintenance activities have to be extended to rural areas as well as extentions of the program in order to reach down the poverty line.
 It remains a challenge to develop a good project design that satisfies both the needs of microfinance and of carbon finance. One other carbon finance question still remains open: who is&nbsp;the best focal point for carbon finance - is it the microfinance institution, the project developer, the energy product provider or a joint venture set up between all stakeholders? It will be on future project developers to find the best solution.<br>
-[[Image:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg|center|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]](Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB)<br>
+[[Image:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg|center|350px|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]](Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB)<br>
 [[Category:Workshop_Substance]]

← Older revision		Revision as of 18:50, 5 May 2011
Line 99:		Line 99:

	[[Image:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg\|center\|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]](Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB)<br>		[[Image:Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg\|center\|Pic MF&E Workshop.jpg]](Pictures of the meeting have been made available online: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjufd4vB)<br>
−
−	~~= Annex 1 - Workshop Participants<br> =~~
−
−	~~{\| width="700" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="1" border="1"~~
−	~~\|+ Workshop Participants~~
−	\|-
−	~~\| Participant~~
−	~~\| Organisation~~
−	~~\| <br>~~
−	\|-
−	\|
−	Ellen Morris<br>Franziska Heidenreich<br>François Bary<br>Francesca Randazzo<br>Julika Breyer<br>Emmanuel Beau<br>Jakob Schäfer<br>Pascal Geslain<br>Delphine Bazalgette<br>Gabrielle Harris<br>Noara Kebir<br>Daniel Philipp<br>Sebastian Groh<br>Natalia Realpe<br>Klara Lindner<br>Jose-Maria Ordeix<br>Jonas Heipertz<br>Nikolai Kompart<br>
−
−	\|
−	~~Sustainable Energy Solutions<br>myclimate<br>LuxDev<br>ADA Luxembourg<br>LFS Financial Systems<br>SIDI France<br>giz Financial Systems Dev.<br>Planet Finance~~
−
−	~~<br>MicroEnergy International~~
−
−	\|
−	~~<br>~~
−
−	\|}
−
−	~~<br>~~
−
−	~~<br>~~

	[[Category:Workshop_Substance]]		[[Category:Workshop_Substance]]

@@ Line 107: / Line 107: @@
 | Participant
 | Organisation
-| Email Address
+| <br>
 |-
+|
@@ Line 118: / Line 118: @@
+|
-ellen@sustainable-solutions.com<br>franziska.heidenreich@myclimate.org<br>bary@lux-development.lu<br>francesca.ada@microfinance.lu<br>julika.breyer@lfs-consulting.de<br>e.beau@sidi.fr<br>jakob.schaefer@giz.de<br>pgeslain@planetfinance.org<br>dbazalgette@planetfinance.org<br>gharris@mfchina.cn<br>noara.kebir@MicroEnergy-International.com<br>daniel.philipp@microenergy-international.com<br>sebastian.groh@microenergy-international.com<br>natalia.realpe@microenergy-international.com<br>klara.lindner@microenergy-international.com<br>jose.ordeix@microenergy-international.com<br>jonas.heipertz@microenergy-international.com<br>nikolai.kompart@microenergy-international.com
+<br>
 |}