The ICR Facility provides technical assistance to national and sub-regional development finance institutions (DFIs) in African, Caribbean and Pacific countries to become stronger institutions and to identify, prepare and implement projects and investments with high development impact, especially related to women’s economic empowerment (WEE) and gender-lens investing (GLI). Since 2020, over 50 DFIs have benefitted from our support.
The ICR Facility provides technical assistance for DFIs to become stronger institutions and to identify, prepare and implement projects and investments with high development impact, especially related to women’s economic empowerment (WEE) and gender-lens investing (GLI).
The ICR Facility periodically selects DFIs that benefit from this tailor-made technical assistance, capacity building and advisory services. Each bank chooses the topics and forms of assistance based on its strategic priorities. Where possible, activities targeted towards a specific DFI are opened to other banks in order to facilitate knowledge sharing and peer exchange.
From 2020 to 2022, we worked in depth with six DFIs:
The topics of support are chosen directly by the banks. For example, we supported the Development Bank of Rwanda with their accreditation to the Green Climate Fund and their monitoring and evaluation. For the Development Bank of Samoa, we provided support in credit risk management, customer relations, innovative financing for MSMEs, and climate finance.
In 2022, the ICR Facility published a Call for Proposals with a special focus on providing support on women’s economic empowerment and gender-lens investing issues. Following this Call for Proposals, a new set of banks has been identified to receive support from 2023 to 2025 on gender mainstreaming activities such as carrying out institutional gender gap analyses, developing gender policies and strategies, and integrating a gender-lens in internal and client-facing operations of the DFIs.
As other public institutions originating from countries which are member states of the OACPS, DFIs can apply to demand-based technical assistance on investment climate reform and policy dialogue to improve the business environment. This short-term technical assistance of up to 90 expert days can include:
As for all interventions of the ICR Facility, requests for support should include a strong gender focus.
Find out more about our previous and ongoing interventions with DFIs:
The ICR Facility disseminates good practices and lessons learned and promotes dialogue and knowledge-sharing between national and regional institutions as well as between geographical regions.
The DFI exchange group is a space for DFIs to share and showcase their best practices and experiences with their peers.
On this page, you can access more information on our DFI exchange group as well as download past training materials and presentations shared during sessions:
The ICR Facility provides support to national or sub-regional DFIs, wholly or partially financed by public funds and with a development mandate. Commercial financial institutions are not eligible. DFIs must be based in a member state of the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OECP).
The banks receiving tailor-made technical assistance for the period 2023-2025 have already been selected. However, DFIs can apply for technical assistance on business environment reform for GLI and WEE on a regular basis via this page. Additionally, we examine requests for groups trainings and knowledge sharing activities (peer to peer events, webinars, networking activities...) on an ongoing basis. You can contact us as info@icr-facility.eu.
No, the ICR Facility does not provide financial support. We provide fully funded technical assistance only, in the form of trainings or advisory services. We cannot pay for staff time of organisations or for equipment.
DFIs request the topics of technical assistance, the content of the technical assistance is then discussed between the DFI and the ICR Facility. The ICR Facility does not pay for equipment nor for the technical development of IT services such as websites, apps, databases, and other. We may however be able to work with you on conceptualizing your IT solution content-wise (e.g. technical studies for the conceptualization of a digital solution that will contribute to improve the investment climate).
As the ICR Facility focuses its interventions on women's economic empowerment (WEE) and gender-lens investment (GLI), the majority of the technical assistance we provide must have a direct or indirect impact on WEE and/or GLI.
The ICR Facility aims to equally serve eligible entities from all ACP countries with its available resources. Supporting the same beneficiary more than once is therefore only possible under certain circumstances. A second request from the same beneficiary will only be considered for approval if the first intervention has been successfully concluded and the requester can provide evidence of early results.
The implementing agencies of the ICR Facility are solely responsible for the selection and supervision of experts deployed. They will do this in close cooperation with the requester but according to the rules and procedures applicable to them. The ICR Facility can only deploy experts based on its implementing partner´s internal procurement processes. These are set up to ensure fair and open competition. If you know of qualified experts, who fit the tendering criteria, we are happy to include them in the procedure.
Based on the nature of the request for technical assistance, implementation may be virtual or on-site, or a combination of both.
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