Foreign Affairs committee  I'm most familiar with the Dutch system. The Dutch government first gave a tax benefit to institutions that created funds that enabled citizens to make types of impact investments. They weren't necessarily development funds. They could also be environmental funds. In the end, fou

Foreign Affairs committee  DID has two investment funds. We invest with our own money, DID's equity. Part of our money is set aside to invest in financial inclusion. The risk limits are based on the countries, structures and funding tools we use. We also have another fund, a limited partnership that has ex

Foreign Affairs committee  I have lots of examples in mind, but one of the DFIs I think is doing very good work right now in Central Asia is EBRD. There's been a very difficult economic situation in recent years in Azerbaijan, Tajikistan, and several other countries. Whereas private capital flows have disa

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. It's a good question. On the way we choose our countries, basically we're looking for countries where access to finance is low. We're a small investor on the global scale in microfinance. There are some very large funds investing these days. We're looking for countrie

Foreign Affairs committee  I agree that no institution will be immune to controversy. They should allow for some degree of failure. In fact, they should share their failures. To me, the most interesting kind of accountability would be to share failures, besides reporting on outcomes and activities, which i

Foreign Affairs committee  It's certainly challenging to distinguish yourself with a smaller budget and the goal of being profitable as quickly as possible. With a very clear mandate or very specific areas of focus, the DFI could distinguish itself and become a leader in certain areas.

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes. That's one example. However, if the DFI focuses only on small investments, the operating and administrative costs will be higher. As an investment manager, I would want the DFI to have a clear mandate and to distinguish itself in one or two specific areas. If the DFI tries

Foreign Affairs committee  I don't know of other DFIs that have a model like this one. The Dutch have the FMO, which is funded partly by the government and partly by the banks. However, there are a number of European funds. European law allows for much greater risks in retail banking, so there are a numbe

Foreign Affairs committee  Personally, I don't think the returns would necessarily be lower. A fund can be structured to make the returns acceptable. In any case, the returns are very low right now. Tax benefits could certainly promote investment. However, in my experience, European citizens don't ask for

Foreign Affairs committee  I completely agree with you. We're very concerned about this. We were pleased to learn that the government won't use aid money to fund the DFI. We understand the funds will be added to the budget. One doesn't replace the other. It's an additional tool. However, we want to see t

Foreign Affairs committee  I think that's a very good point. It's a dilemma or one the challenges of investing for development. The thing with microfinance is that it's been around for quite a long time. Many grants were made throughout the world in emerging countries to help bring up microfinance. Initia

Foreign Affairs committee  The main complication in working with DFIs tends to be that they have very heavy legal departments. This heavy legal approach just doesn't work very well when we have local partners. We're working with organizations. We invest in microfinance or financial inclusion institutions

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Hello. Committee members, I'm very pleased to be here today to support the committee in its study of the development finance initiative. Développement international Desjardins is part of the Desjardins financial group. It was established in 1970. It's a