Building on digital solutions and innovative partnership models, use cases could be implemented to boost financial inclusion and facilitate access to financing among agri-value chain players

Tunisia is continuing its efforts to promote financial inclusion as a factor of resilience and a lever for sustainable economic growth. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the urgency of supporting financially excluded populations, in particular low-income people and small enterprises in vulnerable sectors such as agriculture, an important sector in the Tunisian economy, as it accounts for 10% of the GDP, 12% of exports and employs 14% of the labour force. However, the sector faces structural challenges such as land fragmentation, lack of formal land titles, high vulnerability to climatic hazards, ageing and lack of education of the agricultural population as well as a predominance of traditional agricultural techniques.

The study conducted by Matine Consulting on behalf of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) in 2021 on three agricultural value chains in Tunisia (olive oil, dates and tomatoes) revealed that Tunisian farmers rely heavily on cash and informal sources of financing. 96% of them use cash in their disbursement and collection operations and 60% rely on informal sources to cover their capital needs. The study allowed to estimate a potential for payments digitization of 3.7 billion dinars ($1.2 billion), a working capital financing need of 810 million dinars ($250 million), and an investment financing need of 5.7 billion dinars ($1.8 billion).

4 use cases have been designed and could be implemented in order to satisfy those needs, building on the following principles :