Blue finance guidance notes: Microfinance for small-scale fisheries

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This “microfinance for small-scale fisheries” brochure is one of the Blue Finance guidance notes, prepared under FAO's Blue Growth Initiative. Other brochures in the Blue Finance guidance notes series cover subjects such as insurance for small-scale fisheries and aquaculture, blue bonds, blended finance and innovative investment approaches. The Blue Finance guidance notes aim to provide governmental, non-governmental, private and public stakeholders with information, resources and concrete pathways for obtaining finance to support blue growth transitions at local, national, regional and global scales.

This brochure describes why microfinance is important for small-scale fisheries and aquaculture and gives insight in microfinance and how it works. The benefits of microfinance for small-scale fisheries are listed and challenges and solutions are discussed. The brochure shows how to create an enabling environment for credit and microfinance provision in support of blue growth and presents models for the provision of microfinance services to small-scale fishers. It also contains some case studies from successful aquaculture and fisheries microfinance projects in the Gambia, India and Viet Nam.