On June 6, 2011 MFTransparency and the Association of MicroFinance Institutions of Zambia (AMIZ) will co-host a workshop in Lusaka, Zambia to launch the Transparent Pricing Initiative in Zambia, the sixth country in the MasterCard Foundation-funded enabling APR & EIR Program.

MicroCapital: MFTransparency recently announced plans to expand its Transparent Pricing Initiative to Guinea Bissau and Tanzania with the objective of collecting and publishing pricing data for microfinance products offered in each country and providing training on financial literacy for microfinance clients.

On June 10, 2011 MFTransparency and the Tanzania Association of Microfinance Institutions (TAMFI) will co-host a workshop in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania to launch the Transparent Pricing Initiative in Tanzania, the seventh country in the MasterCard Foundation-funded enabling APR & EIR Program. A second workshop in Arusha will follow on June 13.

MFTransparency will expand the Transparent Pricing Initiative in West Africa to Guinea Bissau next month with a workshop in Bissau on Tuesday June 14th. The Transparent Pricing Initiative in West Africa, sponsored by Luxembourg Cooperation, is focused on promoting transparent pricing and consumer protection in microfinance throughout the countries of West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU).

Smart Campaign: This new tool, a collaboration of MFTransparency and the Smart Campaign, describes how financial service providers observe the principle of transparency, current resources that exist to help providers understand and communicate their prices to clients, and information on where providers can find more information.

Results: Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank and a pioneer of modern microfinance, has been ousted from his position of Managing Director of the bank he founded.

Microfinance Centre (MFC) for CEE & NIS: MFTransparency is selected as an official technical assistance provider for the MFC Social Performance Start-up Fund for Networks.

Oikocredit: In 2010, concerns have accompanied successes in the development finance sector. For Oikocredit – one of the world’s largest private microfinance financiers – the year was one of solid social and financial performance and further innovations in the field of social performance management.

One interesting pricing disclosure policy we’ve observed is the WAEMU usury cap on microloan pricing. I have been conducting research and interviews on this policy as part of a case study on how this cap was developed, implemented and what impact it has on the WAEMU microfinance markets.

La méthodologie de MFTransparency est une combinaison de collecte de données tarifaires et de diffusion ainsi que l’enseignement et la formation. Dans le cadre de notre série croissante de matériel pédagogique, nous travaillons sur le développement d’une série d’études de cas pour mettre en évidence des exemples intéressants de pratiques et politiques de tarification que nous observons dans le monde.