Financial inclusion cannot afford to stall.
Digital rewards and risks
These solutions continue to evolve with dizzying speed. Efficient and effective fintech innovations that could hardly be imagined five years ago will change the face of financial inclusion decisively in the future. Biometric forms of ID are already being used in India and Pakistan.
In China, Ant Financial has provided credit to more than 4 million small businesses using customers’ data rather than banking history. Other solutions include digitized government payments, crowdfunding, and person-to person lending.
The future of our societies will be shaped by technology, for good and for bad. Threats related to digital financial services are hard to predict and preparation is vital.
Laying the foundations
The Special Advocate and her partners have identified a set of prerequisites—policies and infrastructure—needed in order for digital finance to take off and unleash financial inclusion.
These include data privacy, cybersecurity, IDs, infrastructure such as reliable electricity, connectivity, interoperability, financial and digital literacy, and fair competition. Notably, their provision falls largely outside the financial sector.
Co-creation
Finding solutions that work for everyone will require regulators and providers to engage actively with low-income customers; governments and businesses to co-design the objectives and action plans of national financial inclusion strategies; fintech innovators to help regulators create supportive rules; and digital operators to work with the standard-setting bodies to design principles that can protect the financial system as well as customers.