With an emphasis on inclusive financial integrity, Cenfri provides technical assistance, tools and skills building to policymakers, regulators, supervisors and compliance heads looking to apply risk-based and outcomes accountable approaches to money laundering, terrorism financing and proliferation-financing risk strategies. Combining our understanding of relevant risks, familiarity with the FATF guidelines, knowledge of identity and identity-proofing capabilities and leveraging our competency in risk data analytics, we support financial service value chains undertake assessments from national level to the financial product level, thereby enabling the adoption of appropriate customer due diligence practices. Cenfri is committed to assisting countries to move off the grey list responsibly, shaping national risk assessment processes with empirical data and working with remittance services’ compliance managers to ensure that low-income households are not disproportionately affected in receiving low-value remittances. We are interested in mitigating the longer-term impact of illicit financial flows using digital technology (regtech, suptech and AI) to evaluate and monitor illicit flows and enhance inclusive financial integrity. We have worked with BankServ Africa, FSD Africa, GIZ, IFAD’s Financing Facility for Remittances, UNCDF and AFI on a range of financial integrity and identity projects. |
Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) in conjunction with Cenfri and supported by FSD Africa are pleased to officially launch the Inclusive Financial Integrity Toolkit. Countries in the sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) region have been on a development curve in setting up effective Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Combating the Financing of Terrorism
Innovation opportunities for enhanced remittance access As part of our Remittance Access Ininitative (RAI), Cenfri conducted a regulatory assessment of seven countries (Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa, The Gambia and Uganda) to consider whether the regulatory environment was conducive to innovations around the know-your-customer (KYC) and customer due diligence
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the vulnerability of people, and the financial and other systems that underpin much of our daily existence. Remittance recipients in Africa are likely to be particularly hard hit by both the immediate and longer-term effects of the pandemic. In 2018 alone, personal remittance flows to
BankservAfrica and Cenfri investigate the role of ID proxy initiatives in transforming payment ecosystems in Africa and beyond. Real-time instant payments have become a hallmark of the digital economy and financial system. As part of our growing work in payment ecosystems, this report clarifies and investigates proxy and addressing
The problem of illicit financial flows is recognised in the SDGs yet little progress has been made in combatting them Illicit financial flows (IFFs) are typically understood as “dirty money” crossing borders. The term covers a number of different cross-jurisdictional crimes including money laundering (ML), bribery, corruption, resource smuggling, human
Read our latest report with the Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) exploring KYC innovations It is estimated that approximately one billion people across the world do not have access to an officially recognisable identity. Most of these people live in developing economies. The ability of a person to prove their
We all know that sinking feeling when the bank tells you that the proof of address you brought does not meet the required standard. You then have to go back home and search for an original official document sent to your address in the last month or so that is
How do we understand illicit financial flows from a financial integrity perspective? Illicit financial flows (IFFs) are understood to have a negative impact on the growth and development of countries as they drain them of resources that could have been utilised for social spending and other important functions. Moreover, they
A recent study by the World Bank shows that as many as 1.1 billion people live without basic proof of identity. Being able to prove one’s identity is an important enabler in society. It allows one to access critical services, such as health services, government grants and education. It is
The World Bank (2017) estimates that 1.1 billion people live without proof of identity. Nearly 50% of these people live in sub-Saharan Africa, where 454 million individuals are excluded from formal identify systems. In Nigeria, 78% of the population or 149 million individuals cannot prove their identity. Lack of identity documentation
Countries in the sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) region have been on a development curve in setting up effective Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Combatting the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) regulatory responses that meet the international Financial Action Task Force (FATF) standards. FATF is a global body mandated with setting standards on financial
