eco.business Fund and Family Bank partner to strengthen agricultural lending capacity in Kenya through training
Luxembourg and Nairobi, 25 January 2023 – The Development Facility of the eco.business Fund partnered with Family Bank in Kenya to offer specialized agrifinance training to Family Bank staff to optimize the bank’s capacity to reach sustainable agri-businesses and better identify eligible sub-borrowers.
The agriculture sector is vital both to Family Bank and the Kenyan economy. Therefore, the fund has identified several activities to boost the bank’s agricultural lending capacity including a tailored training on lending to the agricultural sector. The new training program is in line with the Development Facility’s technical assistance mandate to build staff capacity and implement credit assessment technologies.
More than 100 staff of Family Bank across different departments; including business development, relationship management, and credit analysis, have been trained on various topics such as agricultural value chain finance, risk management and climate smart agriculture. A quarter of all trainees were women. The trainings have been tailored to the needs of Family Bank and took place in different Family Bank regions across Kenya, namely Embu, Nakuru, Nairobi, Kericho, and Mombasa.
Ms. Lisa Stahl, Chairperson of the eco.business Development Facility for sub-Saharan Africa, stated: “The agricultural sector is key in addressing climate change mitigation but has often been viewed by the banking industry as too risky, which finds us in a scenario where too little attention is given to such a vital sector. Working with strategic partners like Family Bank and enhancing the credit risk and business teams’ capabilities will go a long way in boosting agrifinance opportunities across the country.”
“As a Bank, our focus has been to accelerate businesses to the next level by extending credit. However, to better achieve this we are committed to driving value to critical sectors of our economy such as the agricultural sector. Therefore, by offering such capacity-development trainings to our staff, we are equipping them with further technical expertise to better expose agribusiness entrepreneurs to the growth opportunities that lie in the sector,” said Family Bank Chief Executive Officer Rebecca Mbithi.
About the eco.business Fund
The eco.business Fund aims to promote business and consumption practices that contribute to biodiversity conservation, to the sustainable use of natural resources, and to mitigate climate change and adapt to its impacts in Latin America and the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa.
The fund pursues its mission by providing dedicated financing and technical assistance to financial institutions and businesses committed to sustainability and focuses on four economic sectors: agriculture and agri-processing, fishery and aquaculture, forestry, and sustainable tourism.
By leveraging the power of blended finance, the fund is able to amplify its impact and outreach by drawing its capital from various layers and investing either via financial intermediaries or directly in businesses.
An impact investment fund advised by Finance in Motion, the eco.business Fund was initiated by Germany’s KfW Development Bank and Conservation International with financial support from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and the European Union.
The fund’s impact management system, through its advisor, Finance in Motion, underwent an independent verification by impact auditor BlueMark affirming strong Operating Principles for Impact Management alignment in 2021.
For more information, please visit www.ecobusiness.fund and follow us on Twitter @ecobusinessfund
About Family Bank
Family Bank is a financial institution that prides itself in growing a strong retail customer base with a key focus in SME banking anchored on the positive transformation of people’s lives in Africa. Family Bank is the fifth-largest bank in Kenya, as of Dec 2020, in terms of branch network with 93 branches across 32 counties. The Bank has over 600,000 customers, 4,800 bank agents, over 8,000 merchants countrywide with total assets exceeding KES 100 billion and a deposit base in excess of KES 80 billion.
Family Bank prides itself in being a digitally innovative bank having been the first bank to introduce paperless banking through smart card technology and mobile banking, PesaPap, in Kenya and the first to launch mVisa service in Africa.
In 2021 Family Bank received two awards; Financial Communication Campaign of the Year and Overall Public Relations Campaign of the Year at the 2021 Public Relations Society of Kenya Annual Awards for Excellence for the Corporate Bond Campaign where the Bank raised KES 4.42 billion via public placement marking a subscription of 147.3%. In 2020, Family Bank was voted as the Best Tier Two Bank and the overall second-best bank in Digital and Customer Experience in the Kenya Bankers Association Customer Satisfaction Survey.
Other awards include Bank of the year 2022, for high impact agricultural SME lending by ACELI Africa; Best SME Bank in Kenya at the annual Banker Africa Awards 2017 East Africa –an award initiative for financial institutions in Africa; Think Business Fastest Growing Bank Award three years in a row between 2013 and 2015; and the Think Business Best Bank in Micro-Finance Award, 1st Runner-up in 2013 and 2014. For more information about Family Bank, please visit: www.familybank.co.ke
Media contact eco.business Fund
Anne Johnson
Senior Officer, Marketing & Communications
Email: press@ecobusiness.fund
Phone: +49 (0)69 / 271 035-742
Media contact Family Bank
Bev Naliaka
PR Director
Email: beverlyn.naliaka@tim-skymedia.com
Phone: +254 (0) 728 750 876