Collecting better data on client outcomes is vital to strengthening the impact of inclusive financial service providers for small businesses in emerging markets.
To advance this goal among the companies we support and the broader industry, in 2022, Accion became a founding partner of the MFI Index. Created by the firm 60 Decibels and now in its fourth year, the MFI Index has given the microfinance industry greater visibility into customer outcomes by surveying more than 88,000 customers from 126 financial service providers globally, including many Accion partners.
Accion has continued to deepen our partnership with 60 Decibels over the past few years, supporting additional survey modules on savings and customer protection in 2023, and adding gender and climate modules in 2024. We’ve also increased the number of our portfolio companies participating each year — and their results have helped inform our Impact Report.
Accion’s partner FAMA, a leading microfinance institution in Nicaragua, participated in the MFI Index in both 2021 and 2022. FAMA provides financial services and responsible credit to Nicaragua’s microenterprises, many of them run by women.
Accion’s support for FAMA extends over decades. Accion supported Fama’s founding as an NGO in 1991, and following FAMA’s transition into a regulated microfinance bank, Accion made an initial investment in 2007.
Since then, Accion has continued to support FAMA through both capital and advisory services. In 2017, Accion Emerge made a follow-on investment to help expand FAMA’s outreach and financial services, and in 2020, Accion Emerge provided additional funding to help FAMA and their clients navigate the challenges of the global pandemic. In 2021, Accion extended a bridge loan of $2 million to further support FAMA’s mission.
What the data reveal about FAMA’s impact for small businesses
In the 2024 MFI Index, FAMA ranked within the top 10 financial service providers in Latin America overall. It scored above the 50th percentile across five out of six key dimensions (access to financial services, business impact, household impact, financial resilience, client protection, and agency), with particularly strong results in resilience (95th percentile).
Women reported strong gains across multiple indicators, including first-time access, quality of life, business income, and financial management. Women were 19 percent more likely than men to report ‘very much improved’ ability to make financial decisions (44 percent versus 25 percent), 18 percent more likely to report ‘very much improved’ ability to achieve their financial goals (58 percent versus 40 percent), and 14 percent more likely to report ‘very much improved’ ability to manage finances (55 percent versus 41 percent). Women were also 14 percent more likely to report that their business income ‘very much increased’ (43 percent versus 29 percent).
These results are reflected in clients’ own words. One FAMA client said, “My business has grown with varied merchandise, and more customers are coming. I now sell clothes and appliances, which I didn’t sell before.” These improvements in business translate to a better quality of life. “At home, I’m making improvements, I’ve fixed the missing part of the wall, and I can buy my daughters’ needs 15 days in advance because I have my savings.”
FAMA’s male clients were five percent more likely to report an increase in paid employees. This is likely because 63 percent of women report having no paid employees, working instead as self-employed small business owners.
Clients with longer tenures (greater than two years) also reported stronger gains across multiple indicators, including access, decision making, and ability to meet financial goals. At the same time, clients reported a decrease in the availability of good alternatives compared to the 2022 survey results, which the team attributed partly to a rise in loan sharks and commercial financial services in Nicaragua.
Informing FAMA’s gender and climate strategies
The FAMA team was reassured to see strong results among their women clients in the survey results. FAMA had recently introduced a product specifically designed for women, as well as targeted efforts to improve how women interact with their products.
The FAMA team is also looking forward to monitoring results from climate-related indicators, made possible by this year’s addition of the new climate survey module funded by Accion. The findings on clients’ ability to prepare for and recover from natural disasters and shifting weather patterns will serve as a valuable baseline for future years.
The FAMA team has also been working to improve their policies and resources around environmental and climate readiness. This work is currently under internal review, and the team will soon begin training staff to raise awareness of these new resources. Afterward, FAMA plans to identify and design a green financing product to help clients adopt more sustainable and resilient business practices.
FAMA has also made changes to their regulatory model, which they hope will mitigate reported challenges with processes and wait times, another indicator the team will be tracking for progress in future years.
Overall, with the data FAMA has from two years of listening to its customers through 60 Decibels surveys, they are strengthening their ability to meet customer needs and deepening their impact for Nicaraguan small businesses.
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