by Laura Anderson - Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Events -

MICROCAPITAL EVENT: Belgrade to Host Twelfth Annual MFC Conference of Microfinance Institutions Jointly Organized with Microfinance Development Fund Serbia, Co-Sponsored by responsAbility and Blue Orchard

12th MFC Conference of Microfinance Institutions – Global Crisis: Threat or Opportunity for Microfinance?

 MAY 25-27, 2009, The Continental Hotel, Belgrade, Serbia

The 12th annual MFC Regional Conference aims to improve understanding of the current economic crisis and developments in financial markets and their impact on financial institutions that serve the poor.  The conference will also discuss client protection issues and strategies and measures that will allow MFIs to weather the economic storms and respond to new internal and external challenges.  The event is co-sponsored by Blue Orchard, a microfinance investment manager, and responsAbility, a social investment company.  Other participating institutions may include IFC, KfW, CGAP, ACCION, Pro-Credit, Opportunity Bank Serbia, and Citigroup (along with the Citigroup Foundation).  To view the conference flyer click here. 

Agenda Highlights:

Plenary sessions and discussion round tables, facilitated by top sector experts, will provide opportunities to: 

  • Understand the impact of the global crisis on the sector and the changing role of governments, microfinance investors and donors
  • Study the emerging trends and the regional economic outlook
  • Discuss the implication of the current situation for governments, supervisors and regulators, investors, networks and practitioners
  • Find out about recent initiatives on consumer protection and the roles of sector stakeholders in ensuring client protection 

Technical workshops will explore the following topics: 

  • Growing client over-indebtedness and ways of protecting clients from going into excessive debt
  • Understanding current and emerging crisis related risks
  • Dealing with the crisis: country context MFI scenarios and strategies
  • New and promising experience in introducing client risk-minimizing products: insurance and savings
  • Financing clients’ housing needs in the economic crisis conditions
  • Assessing HR policies and systems in light of business strategy: cuttingedge findings of the recently created Human Capital Centre
  • Advantages and disadvantages of various MFI valuation methods
  • Microfinance sector development in Serbia
  • Access to finance trends in ECA
  • Social Performance Management (SPM) indicators and benchmarks 

(The plenary sessions and selected workshops will be simultaneously translated into Russian and Bosnan/Serb/Croatian) 

Additional Events

  • HR pre-conference, half-day training (on Monday 25th May, before noon)
  • Investor’s and Support Industry Fair
  • Women Advancing Microfinance (WAM) meeting
  • MFC Membership Meeting 

Early Registration Deadline is March 31, 2009.  Deadline for payments is April 24, 2009.  Early registration fees are USD 420 for MFC members, USD 560 for non-members.  After March 31 cost to attend is USD 490 for MFC members, USD 660 for non-members.   To register click here.  For more information or to become a sponsor please contact: 

Marcin Rataj

Project Coordinator

Koszykowa 60/62 m. 52, 00-673 Warsaw, Poland

Tel: (+48 22) 622 34 65

Fax: (+48 22) 622 34 85

Email: marcin@mfc.org.pl

 

By Laura Anderson, Research Associate

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