Technical assistance to financial institutions in serving and expanding education finance market in select Asian countries

Opportunity’s EduFinance Technical Assistance Facility (ETAF) aims to improve the capacity of financial institutions to handle education-focused finance (EduFinance) through Technical Assistance (TA). ETAF helps financial institutions to perform their education related business, meet their growth targets, achieve development impacts, and reach financial and organisational sustainability. 

The assistance has been performed in a broad operational area, with a focus on the following areas: 1) market research, 2) product development, 3) staff training, 4) portfolio analysis, and 5) risk management.

Following were the project objectives:

1. Work with ETAF to deliver technical assistance 
   to partners in India and Asia.
2. Propose MFIs to ETAF and complete process documents to establish official formal relationships.
3. Perform (pre-) due diligence of partner-MFIs.
4. Propose technical assistance to MFIs and ETAF
   Perform technical assistance at partner-MFIs.
5. Deliver trainings to Education Finance financial institution partners-FIs.
6. Monitor and report upon progress of technical assistance activities at partner-FIs.
7. Support partner financial institutions in market research, financial product development and refinement, process mapping, risk management, marketing strategy, pilot test planning, pilot review, training design and delivery for newly developed or renewed education finance products.

To achieve the desired objectives, a hybrid approach combining desk research and primary research was employed. Specifically, mixed research methods integrating qualitative and quantitative techniques were utilized during primary research to: Conduct market sizing and to estimate demand for education finance, in select geographies across India, Indonesia, and Nepal.

Following were the work done by Samavit team:

1. Conducted market research (coordination, planning, monitoring, review, presentation to partner) and finalised the market research reports for 10-12 financial institutions (Pahal, Midland, Annapurna, Credit Access Grameen, SMILE, Shiksha, Lakshya, Protium, MannDeshi Mahila Coop Bank, Sonata, Arth Finance, etc.)

2. Developed and/or renewed financial products and processes.

3. Conducted pilot test planning, pilot review and roll-out planning.

4. Designed and delivered trainings for the financial institutions.

5. Developed and delivered credit and risk assessment for the above mentioned 10-12 financial institutions.

6. Led and developed digital financial services (DFS) approach readiness for a few partner financial institutions.

7. Reporting, documentation, approach development and support to Asia team and ETAF team.