*************************************************************************** The electronic version of this document has been prepared at the Fourth World Conference on Women by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in collaboration with the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women Secretariat. *************************************************************************** AS WRITTEN Statement by Intl. Coalition on Women and Credit to the Fourth World Conference on Women Beijing, China, 7th September 1995 If there is one message that goes forth from these meetings In Hairou and in Beijing, let it be that low income women are leading the change, by organizing around economic activities and by gaining access to finance. Most people in our world are poor, and most poor people are women. Almost all poor women work. They are self employed and run microenterprises. They want access to finance, information and markets, so that they can build income and assets. They use this income to change their own realities, to create their own safety nets . If we as women want our values to shape our world, we need economic power. Without economic power, it will be difficult to get political power. We need to take the lead in reshaping our world’s financial systems so that they serve the poor majority. No more crying now. In Mexico City, at the first world conference on women, the focus was on women as victims, women as passive beneficiaries of social services. Ten women from five continents cried out that low income women are the entrepreneurs, the producers, the invisible economic backbone of our countries. They need and want access to finance, information, markets-- not charity, not subsidies, not pity. We managed to get one sentence into the Action Platform on low income women and economic power, on the importance of access to credit. And we formed the idea of Women's World Banking, which has pioneered low income women's access to credit. I believe that WWB is the most concrete result of Mexico City, of Nairobi. Now we are becoming a movement. The International Coalition on Women and Credit, which UNIFEM was instrumental in helping to start and which is housed in Women's World Banking, involves over 30 of the leading local and network NGOs and poverty banks, that together reach over 4 million women with credit and savings services. These organizations include Grameen and CASHPOR, the World Council of Credit Unions, the ACCION and FINCA networks of Latin America, SEWA Bank and the Women's World Banking global network. It is these organizations that have led the way in showing that poor women are bankable In all of these organizations, low income women repay their loans. And these organizations, with unsubsidized lending rates, are building strong organizations with a large and growing reach of low income women. We in the Coalition on Women and Credit have come together to make sure that Beijing becomes a platform for action in opening low income women’s economic participation, through access to finance. We have succeeded in having a major influence on the Beijing Platform for Action. About one third of the document deals with women’s economic participation and power. It provides concrete action steps to build low income women’s access to finance, information and markets. Much of this language comes from the UN Expert Group on Women and Finance, led by WWB, which pulled together 40 of the world’s microfinance leaders. There commendations of this Expert Group already have been adopted by all of the major donors supporting microfinance. We have been successful in mobilizing many of the world's financial leaders to focus on building financial systems that work for the majority. We as a Coalition have been active in the creation and structuring of the new World Bank fund for microfinance, which is the first time the World Bank supports NGOs directly. The Coalition's messages, and the major recommendations of the UN Expert Group on Women and Finance report have been reflected in the Action Platform, with no brackets. We must make sure that these areas of consensus become the key messages of Beijing. We must make sure that we take these action recommendations home and use our leadership to make them realities. Each country needs a range of institutions that are committed to serving low income entrepreneurs--NGOs, poverty banks, cooperatives, credit unions and commercial banks. These institutions should meet high standards of performance--excellent repayments, nonsubidized interest rates, clear paths to operating and financial self sufficiency. These institutions should adopt lending approaches that respond to local realities, rather than engaging in mechanical replication of what has worked elsewhere. These institutions need to go to where the women are, they need to provide quick and convenient access to finance. They should have strong, participative structures. Those institutions that meet high standards of performance and reach should be capitalized, get access to loan funds, and support for institutional development. The Coalition is pushing to reach 100 million low income women with access to finance by the year 2005. In 1985, fewer that l million poor women had access to financial services from anybody but the money lenders. In 1995, NGOs, poverty banks, credit unions and innovative commercial banks are reaching 10 million women. We are aiming for another tenfold increase over the next ten years. This will require major shifts in the way our world’s resources are allocated. It will require that governments, NGOs, banks and external funders all play new roles in making this happen. As women, we need to use our leadership to shape financial systems that will help poor women transform our world.