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YouSustain Conference
The YouSustain Conference seeks to create a platform for young people, developmental agencies, and researchers to have an intellectual discourse on how best young people can be supported to contribute to urban sustainability in sub-Saharan Africa through ecopreneurship.
The conference specifically seeks to:
Provide a networking opportunity for young people involved in ecopreneural businesses to share knowledge and potentially collaborate for green business development.Create a platform for young people to showcase their green businesses, products, and services, and gain exposure and visibility for their work to explore avenues for upscaling.Explore how solutions for sustainability in sub-Saharan African cities can be transformed into viable youth-led ventures and identify enabling factors and potential barriers to their establishment and growth.Achieving sustainability in urban cities is a struggle for most countries in Africa. Although the challenges of achieving sustainability in some of these cities are unique, shared challenges are ubiquitous across the continent such as low institutional capacity, poor infrastructural facilities, and environmental degradation. At the forefront of these challenges are young people because they represent the majority of the region’s population. While African cities strive to overcome the hurdles, governments in the developed world are partnering with international development agencies and other stakeholders to create avenues for young people to establish business enterprises that draw on the nexus between entrepreneurship and sustainability known as ecopreneurship. Such business principles generate income and sit at the heart of sustainability through efficient resource use and a significant cutback on environmental degradation.
Opportunities for young Africans to venture into ecopreneurship are dire due to the socio-cultural practices and a lack of financial and technical support for them as they venture into business. Hence, the YouSustain Conference seeks to create a platform for young people, developmental agencies, and researchers to have an intellectual discourse on how best young people can be supported to contribute to urban sustainability in sub-Saharan Africa through ecopreneurship.
- Tags
- Conference, Webinar
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G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion – Action Plan for Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise Financing
G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion – Action Plan for Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise Financing
Join us on May 29th, 2025, at 8:00 AM EDT for an insightful discussion of the G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion (GPFI) Action Plan for Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise Financing, recently released.
The Action Plan
The G20/GPFI for MSME Financing Action Plan is a call to action for G20 and non G20 countries to intensify their efforts to close the MSME financing gap given the potential impact on productivity, job creation and achieving the sustainable development goals. The credit gap alone for formal MSMEs has been estimated at 19% GDP as of 2019, for emerging markets and developing economies. Countries worldwide can use this Action Plan voluntarily as a framework for policy prioritization, design, and implementation.
The Action Plan calls for policymakers to prioritize improvements in the enabling environment for MSME financing, as these actions carry limited fiscal costs but could bring sizable benefits. Policymakers should build the core enabling environment that can support the expansion of debt financing, including alternative lenders, as well as equity financing, and the use of financial technology, while mitigating additional risks. In addition, the Action Plan calls for policymakers to improve the effectiveness of the targeted financial interventions they deploy to support MSME financing, by adopting an evidence driven approach for their design and implementation and embedding private capital mobilization as a key objective.
In both cases, the Action Plan proposes a common set of voluntary policy actions that governments in developed and developing countries can use to identify key areas for reform, while mindful of their own country context. The Plan highlights where a differentiated approach might be needed considering the level of development of the countries, or the size of the firms.
Why attend
- Gain insights on the set of actions identified in the Action Plan to improve the enabling environment for MSME finance, as well as the effectiveness of financial support programs.
- Learn how countries are implementing reforms in developed and developing economies countries through a differentiated approach based on country context.
- Learn about the type of support that the implementing partners provide to close the MSME finance gap.
This G20 GPFI Action Plan has been prepared, under the G20 Brazil Presidency, by the following Implementing Partners: World Bank Group, here comprising International Finance Corporation (IFC) and World Bank; with contribution from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the SME Finance Forum (SMEFF), managed by IFC. The action plan development benefitted from the financial support of the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO).
Agenda
- Introduction by Moderator
- Brief overview of the G20 Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion Action Plan
- Country cases from G20 members to illustrate some policy actions: India, Italy and South Africa
- Discussants: WB, IFC, OECD
Time: 8:00 – 9:30 EDT- Tags
- Webinar
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