Please press this link to find the Training Description here
Registration
Number of seats is limited to 25 participants
- Register now via this application form Download here
- The participant must contribute 500 USD (VAT incl.). This fee covers the cost of everything related to the workshop, accommodation (nights and breakfasts from April 23 to 28, 2017 at Crowne Plaza Vientian), lunches on training days, as well as a group dinner that will be organized one night.
This fee does not cover travel costs, and personal expenses (phone bills, mini-bar, dinners, transfer from/to the airport…).
This fee will be paid to ADA and FAO.
- Please, include the last annual report of your organization and the last available MFI Factsheet to the application form. To download the MFI factsheet, please follow this link http://www.microfact.org/microfinance-tools/mfi-factsheet All participants are required to fill the factsheet in order to be considered.
- The application form should be completed and sent with related documents to Savana Phothilath, Microfinance Association, savana@laomfa.local, before the 24th March 2017.
Trainers
A’kos Szebeni is a consultant to the Rural Finance Team and the Investment Center of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations where he is responsible for providing technical assistance to Member States, IFIs and field programmes to promote inclusive rural finance, investment and risk management initiatives, as well as developing a versatile and scalable agricultural credit underwriting toolkit. Prior to joining FAO, he was involved in exploring innovative ways to improve access to finance and investment for MSMEs in emerging economies as a researcher at MicroCapital, a microfinance market intelligence firm. In the past, he has held managerial, technical advisory and analytical roles at global financial institutions such as Citigroup, as well as boutique investment firms where he was responsible for supporting a variety of loan underwriting; financial and credit analysis; market assessment; product development; capital raising; mergers and acquisitions; and private equity transactions for emerging MSMEs globally. His work is primarily concentrated in Asia and Africa, and he has experience in Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Lebanon, Pakistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Uganda and Zimbabwe, among others. Mr. Szebeni holds a Master’s Degree in Development Economics from the University of Rome, is a candidate in the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) program and a faculty member at the Boulder Institute of Microfinance’s annual Rural and Agricultural Finance Program (RAFP)
Niclas Benni is a consultant to the Rural Finance Team of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, working mainly in the areas of capacity building, technical assistance to field projects, and research work related to various aspects of rural finance and investment. Prior to joining FAO, he worked for the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), where his work focused on establishing partnerships with the private sector to co-fund financial provision projects in rural areas. In the past, he has worked extensively on community development projects for refugees in Lebanon and Malaysia, with humanitarian NGOs and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), as well as doing research on the impact of refugee crises on countries’ economies.
Léa Merino works for ADA as a senior project officer in the technical support to MFI unit. She is in charge of implementing and developing technical assistance schemes for MFI. She is particularly involved in several projects such as risk management, governance, and agricultural finance. Hence, she coordinates the agricultural finance programme aiming at supporting financial institutions willing to develop solutions for agricultural value chain actors, or enhance their actual products.
Léa has a Master Degree in Agriculture and Related Industries, and combines a technical experience in the field in farmers’ organizations and a banking/microfinance background. Prior to working at ADA, Léa worked as an agricultural client officer in a French bank for several years, and spent 5 years in Africa as a technical assistant to a newly created MFI. She was also a technical assistant to the Agricultural National Bank of Mali (BNDA) in their Agrifin project dedicated to develop financial products and policies, procedures and tools for individual farmers.
Gauthier Malnoury works for ADA as a project officer in the technical support to MFI unit. He is particularly involved in the projects relating to agricultural finance due to his background. Gauthier is agro economist graduated from Gembloux Agro Bio Tech and Solvay Brussels School (Belgium). Prior to working at ADA, he worked 5 years in Africa (Cameroon, Burkina Faso and Mali) as project manager and consultant mainly in the field of rural and agricultural finance (warehouse receipt system) with the Italian NGO CISV and in the field of social and community forestry for the Belgian NGO Nature Plus.