Knowledge

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.

This document reports on the remarkable achievements of the Financing Facility for Remittances (FFR) in its five years of operation. It provides an overview of the importance of remittances to development, the strategy that the Facility has adopted to date, and the lessons. 

The FFR Brief learned from the innovative projects it has financed. Looking forward, the report highlights the tremendous opportunities offered by large-scale distribution networks, adoption of new technologies, mobilization of migrant capital and partnering with the private sector. Each chapter has been designed to be readable as a stand-alone discussion of the specific topic area it addresses. As a number of projects resulted in lessons learned in multiple areas, projects may be mentioned more than once, and their impact in each topic area will be discussed separately.