Knowledge

On 15 and 16 June 2017, on the occasion of the International Day of Family Remittances, over 350 practitioners from the public and private sectors gathered at the United Nations headquarters in New York for the fifth Global Forum on Remittances, Investment and Development (GFRID). The participants had the opportunity to discuss challenges and opportunities in the remittance market, and present innovative approaches and successful business models, framing the discussions around the role of migrants’ remittances and investment towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SGDs) by 2030.

This report focuses on African National Postal Operators (NPOs) as one of the several distribution channels for remittances and financial services.

Endorsements by the United Nations and international organizations.

Remittances are the traditional means of financial support to family members back home.  This infographic illustrates the global flow of remittances.

This brochure describes the operations of the African Postal Financial Services Initiative, highlighting the unique position of postal networks for extending access to cashless payments and securing affordable financial services in rural areas.

In 2016, around 200 million migrants worldwide sent home an estimated US$ 445 billion to their families in developing countries. These remittances provide for basic necessities such as food, clothing and shelter that are essential to lifting millions of people out of poverty. The truly transformative potential of these funds, however, lies in their investment in education, healthcare and asset building. To meet these needs, the us$36 million multi-donor Financing Facility for Remittances (FFR) has been working since 2006 with the goal of increasing the development impact of remittances and enabling poor households to advance on the road to financial independence and rural transformation. The FFR is administered by IFAD, a specialized agency of the United Nations with the mandate to invest in rural people to eradicate poverty in developing countries.

Brochure that describes the Why, the Who, the Where and the How the the Diaspora Investment in Agriculture (DIA) initiative will seek to foster job growth in local communities, contribute to poverty alleviation and reduce the need to migrate.

This report proceeds from the Global Forum on Remittances and Development held in Milan, Italy in 2015.

​This survey was commissioned by the Financing Facility for Remittances (FFR) of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), and undertaken by Taylor Nelson Sofres, TNS-RMS, in the context of the African Postal Financial Services Initiative (APFSI).