2020 Eswatini - Financial Inclusion Refresh

The 2014 diagnostic report provided the basis for the 2015 MAP financial inclusion roadmap, and a Financial Inclusion Task Team was set up as a steering committee with representatives from the Ministry of Finance, the Centre for Financial Inclusion (CFI – which was preceded by the Financial Inclusion Coordination Agency and the Micro Finance Unit), the Central Bank of Eswatini (CBE) and the Financ. [...] The country has four administrative regions: Hhohho (29% of the population, as of the most recent census: 2017),5 Lubombo (19% of the population), Manzini (32% of the population) and Shiselweni (18% of the population). [...] From a financial inclusion perspective, this includes the development of the National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS) 2017–2022,13 which was published in 2016 by the Eswatini government; the strategy, which was peer- reviewed by the Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) Global Policy Forum in 2016, is a cornerstone of the government’s planning for financial inclusion, and is part of the broad. [...] Poverty in Eswatini is more where 70% of pronounced in rural areas, where 70% of the population live below the international poverty line: the rural areas of the Shiselweni and Lubombo regions the population have high proportions of the population living below the international poverty: live below the about 72% and 67%, respectively. [...] In addition, life expectancy at birth is just over 59 years – although this figure represents an increase from the 55 years at the time of the previous MAP, and from the life expectancy of 43 years at the peak of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in 2005.39 The increase in life expectancy is largely due to interventions such as the roll-out of free antiretrovirals and medication to prevent mother-to-child tra.