FINANCE FOR ALL ? - Frankfurt School of Finance & Management

8 MIN
»THE MARKET
HAS LOST ITS
INNOCENCE.«
How could this monoculture be diversified?
One option would be to provide farmers
with financial instruments they could use
to build up new sources of income. This
is the goal Frankfurt School has been pursuing
since 2007 by way of the Tajik Agricultural
Framework Facility (TAFF), funded
by the European Bank for Reconstruction
and Development (EBRD). We employ 15
experts in Frankfurt School’s Dushanbe office:
agronomists as well as financial experts.
Agrifinance is one of the most effective
levers for diversified farming and for
exporting alternative products.
© JAN stradtmann
Fatma Dirkes verantwortet
weltweit über 100
Beratungsmandate der
Frankfurt School. Dabei
geht es fast immer
um die Entwicklung
eines funktionierenden
Finanzsystems. Und dafür
braucht es mehr als nur
den klassischen Mikrokredit.
Fatma Dirkes kommt gerade aus Duschanbe.
Dort moderierte die Leiterin der International
Advisory Services der Frankfurt
School of Finance & Management
das zweite International Agribusiness Investment
Forum. Über 300 Gäste aus
aller Welt diskutierten bei der Veranstaltung,
die die EU gemeinsam mit der Frankfurt
School ausrichtete, über die neuesten
Trends der Landwirtschaftsfinanzierung.
Frau Dirkes, was macht die Frankfurt
School in Tadschikistan?
Tadschikistan ist einer der wichtigsten
Baumwollexporteure der Welt und versorgt
Webereien von Bangladesh bis nach
Vietnam mit dem "weißen Gold". Allerdings
birgt die tadschikische Monokultur
auch wirtschaftliche Risiken für die Bevölkerung
des Bergstaates: Das Land hängt
sowohl am Weltmarktpreis als auch am
Wetter und ist anfällig für Schädlinge.
Fatma Dirkes looks after
100 advisory assignments
worldwide on behalf of
Frankfurt School. Almost
all of them involve the
development of a fully
functional financial system.
Traditional microloan
just doesn’t have what it
takes.
Fatma Dirkes has just returned from Dushanbe,
where, as head of Frankfurt
School’s International Advisory Services
(IAS), she was moderating the second
International Agribusiness Investment Forum.
The event, hosted by the EU in partnership
with Frankfurt School, saw more
than 300 delegates from all over the world
debating the latest trends in agricultural finance.
Ms Dirkes, what is Frankfurt School doing
in Tajikistan?
Tajikistan is one of the world’s major exporters
of cotton, supplying “white gold”
to the weavers from Bangladesh to Vietnam.
But Tajikistan’s monoculture also
poses certain economic risks to the people
of this mountainous country: it makes
them dependent on world market prices
and the weather, and also very vulnerable
to pests.
Few markets are more global than the agricultural
market. Doesn’t this make it difficult
for Tajikistan?
By providing financial aid to farmers,
you’re automatically involved in global
competition, especially where food prices
are concerned. Even financial traders have
found out that food is an investment opportunity.
In terms of development policy,
however, it’s a real hot potato: ultimately
we’re talking about safeguarding
the food supply for the seven billion people
living on our planet. According to the
Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO),
this figure will rise to ten billion by 2050.
In this respect we’re directly involved in the
fight against poverty, because the regional
markets in, for example, Africa, Central
Asia and the MENA region – that is, the
Middle East and North Africa – are all still
undersupplied.
Is your main priority to make people locally
self-sufficient, or to prepare them for
the global market?
Both. The agricultural structures in
many countries are still not competitive,
either in terms of productivity or finance.
That’s why we’re in Tajikistan: through the
TAFF project we’re helping eight Tajik financial
institutions – four banks and four
microfinance institutions – provide funding
to smallholders. To do this we’re developing
customised credit products and
lending techniques. We’re also training
bank employees how to analyse their clients’
finances. But as well as access to
loans, what Tajik farmers really need is
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