Solidarity Bankers, the Crédit Agricole group's volunteer program

© FGCA

At the initiative of the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation and Crédit Agricole SA, volunteer missions with skills labeled "Solidarity Banker" are offered to employees on behalf of microfinance institutions or "social business" type companies, partners of the Foundation.

Many Crédit Agricole Group employees volunteer for solidarity projects. To support this momentum, the Group launched "CA Solidaires," a program that promotes employee engagement in projects with a positive societal impact. It is within this framework that a new engagement format is now offered to the Group's employees: Solidarity Leave. At the initiative of the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation and Crédit Agricole SA, skills-based volunteer missions labeled "Solidarity Banker" are offered to employees on behalf of microfinance institutions or social businesses that are partners of the Foundation.

This is a unique partnership in the history of Crédit Agricole and the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation. With "Solidarity Banker," the Group and the Foundation are leveraging their synergies and strengthening their efforts to promote sustainable finance. The goal: to leverage the skills of Crédit Agricole Group employees and provide additional support to microfinance institutions and social enterprises supported by the Foundation through pro bono assignments carried out by employees.

First missions to Burkina Faso, Senegal and Cambodia

The first mission carried out under the "Solidarity Banker" program took place in Burkina Faso, in cooperation with Crédit Agricole Assurances. Eduardo Cardoso de Miranda, a borrower insurance expert at CA Assurances, assisted the Foundation in conducting due diligence on the company CIF-VIE. Created in 2013 with the support of RCPB, the main Burkinabé microfinance cooperative network, and the NGO ADA, CIF-VIE operates in the microinsurance sector and holds 6% of the local market share. Currently entering a new stage in its growth, CIF-VIE is opening its capital to new shareholders. Thanks to the contributions made by CA Assurances, the Foundation was able to better understand the structure and assess the possibility of investing in it. The evaluation of the CIF-VIE financing application is underway.

A second mission took place in Senegal, in favor of the Laiterie du Berger, a social enterprise in which the Foundation is a shareholder and which currently supports more than 800 Fulani herders in the north of the country. With the support of Crédit Agricole Franche-Comté (a shareholder of the Laiterie du Berger), Jonathan Michaud, an agricultural engineer from the Caisse Régionale, went on a two-week technical assistance mission. The objective: to structure an operational framework allowing the transition from experimentation to the deployment of 15 pilot mini-farms of the Laiterie. The result of the mission was the formalization of an action plan and a more ambitious collaboration between Crédit Agricole Franche Comté and the Laiterie is envisaged.

With Banque de Proximité à l'International (BPI), a mission took place between September and October in Cambodia for Chamroeun, a microfinance institution supported by the Foundation. François Galland, Director of International Human Resources, spent two weeks on the ground to help improve the HR management of Chamroeun, a microfinance institution supported by the Foundation. The HR strategy developed following the mission will support the organizational restructuring of Chamroeun, which currently serves more than 25,200 clients in Cambodia, including 821,300 women.

Upcoming missions to Morocco and Kazakhstan

Before the end of 2018, two more missions could be launched for Al-Karama in Morocco and KMF in Kazakhstan. Al-Karama currently serves more than 26,200 clients in Morocco. It should be able to benefit from financing and technical assistance as part of a cooperation scheme between the Foundation and Crédit du Maroc, including a "Solidarity Banker" mission to improve its anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing (AML-CFT) systems. KMF is the leading microfinance institution in Kazakhstan with more than 220,000 active borrowers and a portfolio of €257 million. The institution will receive an expert from Crédit Agricole to help it develop its product and service offerings.

The Crédit Agricole Group's commitment to the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation is thus strengthened with the "Solidarity Banker" program, which marks the mutualist Group's commitment to sustainable finance, capable of promoting a more responsible and better shared economy.

How to apply?

Several missions are coming up on CA Solidaires. To discover them:
– Go to the CA Solidaires website “Find your mission”
– Enter “Grameen Foundation” in the search bar. All Solidarity Leave offers will appear!
– Click on the offer of your choice, you will find all the information necessary for your application.
More information: carolina.herrera@credit-agricole-sa.fr