A savings group meeting in Tanzania. © CARE / Nicky Lewin.Barclays, CARE International and Plan International have joined together in an initiative to improve the quality of life for poor people by extending and developing access to basic financial services.

The initiative brings together the resources, skills and experience of each organisation and aims to reach around 400,000 people across Africa, Asia and South America. The aims of the partnership were announced at the Clinton Global Initiative in September 2008 and following detailed planning and development, programme delivery has now started.

This partnership represents a three-year, £10m commitment to support financial inclusion through the development of savings-led community finance. This partnership focuses on savings-led community finance initiatives which are effective in meeting the needs of the poor – providing a way to manage their money and increase their ability to deal with life emergencies.

The partnership has 3 main objectives:

• Outreach: Make use of savings-led community approaches to reach clients who are excluded from or have limited access to formal or informal financial services;
• Impact: Achieve positive socio-economic impact on poor people through the provision of basic financial services within communities that enable people to manage their household finances, and through development of new add-on services (such as enterprise training) and improvement of existing savings-led community finance methodology; and
• Inclusion: Target and reach new or existing clients to improve their level of financial inclusion through the use and trialling of informal and formal financial services, channels and products tailored to the requirements of communities.

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This initiative is unique both in its pioneering cross-sectoral partnership model and in its focus on improving community finance methodology and innovation to drive scalability, sustainability and cost effectiveness.

The partnership aims to deliver projects for savings-led community finance in ten countries across Africa, Asia and South America.

Each country has been listed as “low” or “medium” on the UNDP 2007/2008 Human Development Index ranking and CARE is leading projects in Uganda, Mozambique, Vietnam and Peru whilst Plan is leading projects in Tanzania, Zambia, and Indonesia.

In Kenya, Ghana and Egypt their field offices are working collaboratively to implement projects and share knowledge and resources.

For more information visit: www.barclays.com/bankingonchange