AKDN | Financial Inclusion

AKF supports over 9,000 CBSGs. These promote community-managed financial services as a way of increasing household financial assets and decreasing household vulnerability. CBSGs are self-managed groups of 15-25 people who join voluntarily and meet regularly. Systems are simple and transparent to ensure that the least literate and influential members participate and benefit. They are often led by women and serve as a platform for other interventions which promote access to financial literacy and social and economic opportunities.

The CBSGs and self-help groups also help community institutions and households access formal financial services and digital financial tools. In 2021, 152,000 people (84 percent of whom were women) were able to connect with financial services.

Microfinance institutions run by the Aga Khan Agency for Microfinance (AKAM) and the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (AKFED) help clients meet their day-to-day housing, education and health needs with quality of life loans. The largest proportion of loans they provide are for income-generating activities such as livestock, planting, trading and production. Our agencies also support small and medium enterprises to create jobs and increase economic activity. Other services for traditionally underserved populations, such as those in remote rural areas, include access points to enable the collection of remittances close to home, deposit accounts to store savings securely and mobile banking services to widen access still further.

“Digitalisation has helped banks reach out to those who do not have access to formal financial services in a cost effective, responsible and sustainable manner. Customers are no longer dependent on accessing physical bank locations.”
Sultan Allana, AKFED Director and HBL Chairman

AKFED’s investments in banking and insurance institutions date to the 1930s. These include an interest in:

• Habib Bank Ltd (HBL), Pakistan’s largest and oldest bank, which operates in 15 countries;


• Diamond Trust Bank, which now has a presence in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Burundi;


• DCB Bank in India, which has over 170 branches serving markets in several states in the country;


• Jubilee Insurance Group in Africa, which provides life, health and general insurance products in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and Mozambique;


• Jubilee Life and Jubilee General Insurance in Pakistan, which offer similar products to the Jubilee Insurance Group. In Pakistan, Jubilee General and Jubilee Life are amongst the top insurers in the country; and


• Kyrgyz Investment and Credit Bank, the largest commercial bank in the Kyrgyz Republic.

Each provides training to develop local human resources, advocates best practices in corporate governance, offers services to previously excluded populations and focuses on product innovations that improve quality of life. For example, in Pakistan, HBL delivered the government’s largest social safety net initiative in South Asian history during the COVID-19 lockdown.

These institutions also help create strong and efficient capital markets in Central and South Asia and East Africa. HBL provides investment banking for government and private infrastructure projects, and promotes regional trade flows.