Aga Khan Agency for Microfinance

The First MicroFinanceBank Ltd.: Enabling Individuals
The First MicroFinanceBank Ltd. of Pakistan (FMFB-P) established in 2002 as the first private sector micro-finance bank in Pakistan, is a premier non-commercial bank licensed by the State Bank of Pakistan under the regulatory framework of the Microfinance Institutions Ordinance 2001. It was created through a structured transformation of the credit and savings section of the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP), an institution that had laid the foundations of the microfinance sector in the country in 1982, beginning in the Northern Areas and Chitral.

The Bank is governed by a non-executive, independent Board of directors, which consists in ten professionals including the CEO.

FMFB was created with the mission to alleviate poverty through sustainable economic development and a non-commercial objective of recovering only its inflation adjusted costs. Its objectives are geographical and service outreach, maximal impact on the target clientele, transparency in business conduct and long-term sustainability.
Based on the world’s most comprehensive database from MIX Market, FMFB has recently been ranked as 14th amongst the top 100 Micro-Finance Institutions in the world by CGAP. In a short span of six years, FMFB has established 89 automated branches all over Pakistan, of which more than 57% branches are in rural areas. The Bank has reached out to thousands of poverty-stricken households by disbursing over 340,000 loans amounting to US$ 88.25 million and mobilised US$ 35.43 million in savings from over 125,000 depositors by August 2008.

The Bank reaches out to the poorest segments of society. Given that 71% of poor in Pakistan are women, FMFB has focused on providing financial services to women and as a result, about 40% of FMFB borrowers are women entrepreneurs. With the vast majority of the poor residing in the rural areas of Pakistan, over 70% of the cumulative loan amount disbursed is in rural areas.

Performance Indicators

INDICATORS	2005	2006	2007	Aug. 2008
Number of active loans	17,088	52,679	102,604	179,732
Cumulative Number of loans disbursed	39,622	91,510	195,964	339,038
Number of deposit accounts	27,937	39,161	81,158	125,592
Number of total clients	45,025	91,840	183,762	305,324
Total Loan amount disbursed (US$ MM)	18.02	32.44	56.86	88.25
Loan amount outstanding (US$ MM)	5.21	9.88	17.63	31.85
Deposit Base (US$ MM)	9.33	13.27	29.28	35.43