In November 2018, Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth and Accion launched a first-of-its-kind partnership, with the aim of digitally transforming the lives of millions of underserved people and micro and small businesses.
Accion and Mastercard have since renewed their partnership to support financial service providers and digital platforms serving microentrepreneurs across Africa, Asia, and Latin America. We aim to bring millions more micro and small enterprises— especially women-owned businesses — into the digital economy, so they can use digital financial services to improve their financial health and well-being.
12.8M
12.8 million people reached throughout the project, as of December 2022.
5.6M
5.6 million micro and small businesses using digital tools on a regular basis, as of December 2022.
4X
4X active digital users. Our partners almost quadrupled their number of monthly active digital users since joining the program.
87%
87 percent of users reported increased financial health. Product users interviewed who perceived an increase in their capacity to manage financial challenges.
>70%
More than 70 percent of active digital users were women, as of December 2022.
Project Findings
Key findings about the impact of digital transformation on underserved microbusinesses uncovered during our work from 2018 – 2022. Read the full report.
Across five countries, nearly 87 percent of digital product users reported that product usage contributed to an increase in their capacity to manage financial health challenges.
Sixty-five percent of product users said they increased business growth activities and 80 percent of these users attributed this growth to products developed under the partnership.
Globally, women-owned micro and small businesses said they were able to undertake more business growth activities, and 61 percent said this growth came through the usage of products developed under the partnership.
Those who used digital products more frequently were 30 percent more likely than infrequent users to link improvements in business growth outcomes to these products.
As micro and small businesses interacted with digital loan repayment mechanisms introduced through the partnership, 67 percent indicated broader demand for digital payments.
Despite an increase in digital usage, fear and distrust of information found online is still high amongst micro and small business owners, highlighting that a certain level of human touch remains important.
Accion and Mastercard renew partnership, aim to connect 10.5 million people to digital financial services
Building on four years of work together to enable digital transformation among small businesses, Accion and the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth announced a renewal of their partnership to improve the financial health of micro and small enterprises in emerging economies.
