ITU Regional Standardization Forum For Africa Dakar, Senegal, March 2015 ITU and Digital Financial Services Vijay Mauree, Programme Coordinator, ITU

Why are people unbanked? 2

Financial Inclusion Low levels of financial inclusion represent a barrier to socio economic development in developing countries. Globally, more than 2.5 billion adults do not have a formal bank account, most of them in developing economies 59% of adults in the developing countries do not have a formal bank account 3

Digital Financial Services But most of them have a mobile phone This presents an opportunity to overcome the financial inclusion problem Digital Financial Services allows the "unbanked" to access basic financial services – not necessarily a formal bank account, but to be able to receive money or make payments via the mobile phone A good example is Kenya with M-PESA 43% of the GDP of Kenya flows through MPESA 4

Key Issues Lack of global ICT standards Lack of interoperability Non uniform regulatory framework across countries Need to have a global platform for dialogue between regulators and operators from ICT and, financial services industries. 5

DFS Ecosystem Source: UNCDF

Dialogue between ICT and Financial Services Regulators Consumer Protection Foster best practices to encourage competition Agree on quality of service of mobile networks for digital financial services Interoperability Distribution network Data Security 7

Enter FG Digital Financial Services Established during TSAG Meeting in June 2014 Chaired by Sacha Polverini, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation ITU Contact : Vijay Mauree, Programme Coordinator, Web: First meeting held on 5 December 2014 in Geneva 8

Terms of Reference Main goal: Develop a standardization roadmap for interoperable digital financial services for financial inclusion Objectives – Identify the technology trends in digital financial services over the coming years and how the role of various stakeholders in this ecosystem will evolve. – Establish liaisons and relationships with other organizations. – Describe the ecosystem for digital financial services. 9

Terms of Reference Objectives (continued) – Suggest future ITU-T study items and related actions for various ITU-T study groups – Identify successful use cases for implementation of secure digital financial services including developing countries with a particular focus on the benefits for women. – Study the best practices related to policies, regulatory frameworks, consumer and fraud protection, business models and ecosystems for digital financial services. – Work towards the creation of an enabling framework for digital financial services. Terms of Reference 10

Working Groups 11 Main areas of work Interoperability Consumer Experience & Protection Technology, Innovation & Competition DFS Ecosystem

Mailing Lists Focus Group Digital Financial Services: Working Group Mailing Lists – DFS Ecosystem: – Consumer Experience & Protection: – Interoperability: – Technology, Innovation & Competition: 12 Please subscribe to be kept informed of meetings and events!

Next Meeting of FG DFS Meetings will be held in different regions Next Meeting – April 2015 at World Bank, Washington D.C – 20 April 2015: Meeting of Working Groups, Washington D.C – Meeting will be back to back with the Task Force on Payment Aspects of Financial Inclusion (PAFI) Contact FG DFS Coordinator for more info: – Vijay Mauree 13

14 Thank You / Merci