CERMi News
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Tuesday, February 28, 2023
Interview and publication
A dialogue on the future of microfinance and international development, an interview of Jonathan Morduch conducted by Marc Labie
Published in Mondes en développement 2022/3-4 (n° 199-200), p. 419-434
What has been learned over the last fifty years about microfinance shows that being too simplistic can be unconvincing. Financial inclusion policies and practices have a role to play in order to help poor households facing the challenges of daily life. Microfinance is also seen as way to empower women, and to support the development of rural and agricultural communities. Is the impact of microfinance really over-stated? Which role microfinance and financial inclusion have to play in development?
This conversation tries to pinpoint the key issues to keep in mind. Jonathan Morduch (Professor at NYU, ULB Doctor Honoris Causa), one of the most respected academics in the field of microfinance and financial inclusion, is interviewed by Marc Labie, CERMi codirector, to identify the challenges that microfinance and financial inclusion policies must face. From microcredit to financial health, Jonathan Morduch gives us his perception of what the future of this field could be.
Monday, February 06, 2023
Publication
Influence of international ownership on the performance of local social enterprises: Evidence from the global microfinance industry
By Kwame Ohene Djan, Samuel Anokye Nyarko, Roy Mersland, Leif Atle Beisland, Linda Nakato
International ownership positively impacts the social performance of social enterprises at the expense of financial performance. International owners mostly use their resources and controlling rights to improve social performance at the expense of financial performance. Current ownership theories do not address how the multidimensional utility function might affect the governance and financing of a social enterprise. There is a need to develop theories for firms with conflicting objectives.
Thursday, February 02, 2023
Call for Papers
The European Microfinance Network (EMN) has launched the call for papers for the European Microfinance Research Award 2023.
Thanks to the support of the European Investment Fund, EMN offers a EUR 2,000 prize to the winner who’ll be also invited to attend the EMN Annual Conference in Paris (14-16 June 2023).
Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following: the role of microfinance to support vulnerable populations (in particular women, migrants and young people) and social entrepreneurs, evidence on the impact of microfinance, the role played by innovative financial technologies in facilitating financial inclusion and (social) entrepreneurship, and the importance and usefulness of non-financial services offered to clients. For this edition, papers exploring the role of green inclusive finance in ensuring a just transition in Europe will be especially valued. Papers eligible for selection should present ongoing or finalised research on issues related to inclusive finance in European countries.
To participate, researchers need to send their abstracts by Thursday, 9th March 2023. All relevant information on how to participate to the Award are available on this dedicated page on the EMN website. See also:
LinkedIn
Twitter
Facebook
Thursday, January 19, 2023
Publication 
Handbook of Microfinance, Financial Inclusion and Development
Elgar Handbooks in Development
Edited by Valentina Hartarska, Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology, and Department of Finance, Auburn University, US and Robert Cull, Development Research Group, The World Bank, US.
This timely Handbook collates a range of evidence from top scholars in the field to help readers understand who microfinance reaches, how it helps, and why clients come back. It offers updated views on important concepts that enable a broader framework for understanding poverty and the corresponding financial needs of poor households.
‘This is an outstanding collection of contributions from some of the most highly-respected researchers in the field of microfinance. It provides an excellent overview of the evidence on the success and limitations of microfinance and addresses important topics such as gender and finance, digital finance, and financial literacy. A must-read for anyone interested in microfinance.’
– Niels Hermes, University of Groningen, the Netherlands
‘An impressive collection of articles on many important aspects of microfinance; written by experts in the field and providing a unique and comprehensive overview of where microfinance stands in the 2020s.’
– Thorsten Beck, European University Institute, Italy
Thursday, November 03, 2022
Publication
The Informal Sector and the Environment
Edited By Ranjula Bali Swain & Uma Kambhampati
The informal economy – broadly defined as economic activity that is not subject to government regulation or taxation – sustains a large part of the world's workforce. It is a diverse, complex and growing area of activity. However, being largely unregulated, its impact on the environment has not been closely scrutinised or analysed.
This edited volume demonstrates that the informal sector is a major source of environmental pollution and a major reason behind the environmental degradation accompanying the expansion of economic activity in developing countries. Environmental regulation and economic incentive policies are difficult to implement in this sector because economic units are unregistered, geographically dispersed and difficult to identify. Moreover, given their limited capital base, they cannot afford to pay pollution fees or install pollution abating equipment. Informal manufacturing units often operate under unscientific and unhealthy conditions, further contributing to polluting the environment. The book emphasizes and examines these challenges, and their solutions, encountered in various sectors of the informal economy, including urban waste pickers, small-scale farmers, informal workers, home-based workers, street vendors, and more. If the informal sector is to "Leave no one behind" (as the Sustainable Development Goals promise) and contribute to "inclusive growth" (an objective of the green economy), then its impact on the economy as well as the environment has to be carefully considered.
This book marks a significant contribution to the literature on both the informal economy and sustainable development, and will be of great interest to readers in economics, geography, politics, environment studies and public policy more broadly.
Friday, October 21, 2022
Publication
Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE)
SIMON CORNEE, MARC JEGERS & ARIANE SZAFARZ
Feasible Institutions of Social Finance: A Taxonomy
This paper unpacks the continuum of social finance institutions (SFIs), ranging from foundations offering pure grants to social banks supplying soft loans. The in-between category includes quasi-foundations granting loans requiring partial repayment. In our model, SFIs maximize their social contribution arising from financing successful social projects, under a budget constraint dictated by their funders. We determine the feasibility of each SFI category. Quasi-foundations appear to be efficient and adapted to low market rates. However, reciprocity from SFI borrowers can elicit a so-called hold-up effect, whereby the SFI charges a high interest rate to its loyal clients.
Tuesday, September 20, 2022
Activity Report
Discover our 2021 Activity Report ! 
What you'll find in this edition : Update on our members, seminars in 2021... Awards and prizes and editorial positions of our members...2021 publications by CERMi members as well as conferences...
...and more !
Thursday, September 1, 2022
CERMi Seminar
CERMi is pleased to invite you to the seminar 
Thursday, June 9, 2022
Publication
American Economic Association
MARIE BRIERE, JAMES POTERBA & ARIANE SZAFARZ
Precautionary Liquidity and Retirement Saving
This paper argues that role modeling can explain the impact of boardroom gender diversity on corporate performance. It theorizes that female workers are boosted by female leadership, gain increased motivation, and achieve greater productivity, thereby making their female directors more effective. We test this bottom–up approach to the trickle-down hypothesis on data hand-collected among local cooperatives providing microcredit in Senegal. All the organizations surveyed are similar and small, which allows us to use a homogenous performance metric. All of them outsource their human resource management to the same third party, which mitigates the risk of endogeneity. The data cover over 100,000 triads composed of gender dominance on the board, gender of CEO, and gender of credit officer. A better financial performance is achieved when the triad is gender-uniform—be it male or female—confirming the importance of role modeling and suggesting that the performance of female board members depends on the gender composition of the workforce.
Thursday, May 12, 2022
Publication
Small Business Economics
ANAIS PERILLEUX & ARIANE SZAFARZ
Women in the boardroom: a bottom–up approach to the trickle-down effect
This paper argues that role modeling can explain the impact of boardroom gender diversity on corporate performance. It theorizes that female workers are boosted by female leadership, gain increased motivation, and achieve greater productivity, thereby making their female directors more effective. We test this bottom–up approach to the trickle-down hypothesis on data hand-collected among local cooperatives providing microcredit in Senegal. All the organizations surveyed are similar and small, which allows us to use a homogenous performance metric. All of them outsource their human resource management to the same third party, which mitigates the risk of endogeneity. The data cover over 100,000 triads composed of gender dominance on the board, gender of CEO, and gender of credit officer. A better financial performance is achieved when the triad is gender-uniform—be it male or female—confirming the importance of role modeling and suggesting that the performance of female board members depends on the gender composition of the workforce.
Friday, March 11, 2022
Working Paper
WP CEBRIG 22-002
SIMON CORNEE, ANASTASIA COZARENCO, ARIANE SZAFARZ
The Changing Role of Banks in the Financial System: Social versus Conventional Banks
Social banks have emerged as a new group of banks that call themselves as “alternative”, “ethical”, “sustainable”, and “value-based”. Their small market share increases at a rapid pace and is still expected to grow in the future. Social banks are institutions with both (at least some) activities of financial intermediation and one or several non-financial missions, typically based on environmental and social values. By unpacking the observable, real-life differences between social banks and conventional banks, this chapter paves the way to theorizing the multidimensional characteristics of social banks within the global banking industry. Business models, governance issues, lending technologies; and social outcomes appear to be key aspects to understand how innovative, value-based, social banks work and how they might one day substantively affect mainstream banking business.
Monday, March 7, 2022
Working Paper
WP CEBRIG 22-001
ANASTASIA COZARENCO, VALENTINA HARTARSKA, ARIANE SZAFARZ
The costs and benefits of subsidized microfinance are still controversial. We utilize a cost-function estimation approach that accounts for the double bottom line (social and financial) of microfinance institutions (MFIs) to evaluate how subsidies affect both cost efficiency and risk of mission drift. We control for endogenous self-selection into the business models of credit-only versus credit-plus-deposit. Our results suggest that MFIs that both supply loans and collect deposits need no subsidies to be cost-efficient. In addition, subsidies to these MFIs are associated with an increase in deposit size, which might hurt the most disadvantaged depositors. In sum, combining subsidized funds from donors with deposits increases the risk of mission drift, and can therefore be socially undesirable.
Monday, February 07, 2022
Publication
Discover our 17th CERMi Newsletter !
What you'll find in this edition :
Latest events at CERMi
Awards and prizes
Recent publications by CERMi members
Read all previous news...