Tuba Rai Metin

This week I started working at Tuba Rai Metin (TRM), a Microfinance Institution (MFI) that provides financial services to small businesses and entrepreneurs.  I was graciously welcomed into the office by the Angelo, the CEO, and Subhash, the Transformation Advisor.  I was assigned to learn about the Smart Campaign, create a system to implement the principles of the Smart Campaign, and train the staff on these principles; this is all to be done within my 2 1/2 months here! 

Street view from my office

A little background on microfinance: 

Check out this great video! 

Microfinance was created to help people, usually the very poor, who do not have access to traditional banking services. The idea of microfinance purposes that if given access to financial services, these people will be able to lift themselves out of poverty. However, it is understood that microfinance is not the only answer to ending poverty. 

The Smart Campaign was created to protect clients of the microfinance industry. They have developed 7 Client Protection Principles that responsible MFIs should follow to ensure their clients know their rights as consumers and are prevented from falling victim to over-indebtededness. This is the first industry‐wide client protection initiative and I'm excited to be helping implement these ideas!

My job is to provide TRM with the tools and resources they need to deliver respectful, transparent, and prudent financial services to their clients; I will get these tools and resources from the Smart Campaign. Specifically, one of the things I will look into is how TRM can create a system so their clients can give feedback, make a complaint, or ask questions so they can be served more effectively.  

The Smart Campaign is important because the people who use these financial services- small loans for their businesses, savings accounts, and micro-insurance- are already a vulnerable population and they must be protected. It's important to ensure that the women and men who use these services, are not only able to repay their loans on time, but in doing so are not making huge sacrifices- like going hungry or selling items that are valuable to their business. The Smart Campaign is designed to prevent these huge sacrifices from being made. 

I understand this is a very complicated project to address a huge complicated issue, but I'm really looking forward to learning more about this industry and I hope that my work will go on to benefit the people of Timor-Leste. I'll be sure to keep you updated on the progress!