To achieve the goal of improving the range of financial services that are available to rural populations, the FAO Rural Finance Group has long recognised the need for training and human resource development in financial institutions, government agencies and donor organisations. It is now recognised that field staff who advise and work with rural communities also need improved knowledge of financial planning and management to assist people to make better use of whatever financial services are available.

The FAO Rural Finance Group is engaged with a number of other international agencies in developing a strategy for improving the flow of infomation on best practices in rural finance and relevant training materials to those who have most need of access to this information. The result of this partnership is the Rural Finance Learning Centre, an online reference and training centre for capacity building in rural finance. For further detail please go to the Rural Finance Learning Centre page.

The FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific in Bangkok, Thailand, organises quarterly training courses in which participants learn to install, use and support the FAO-GTZ MicroBanking System. These courses, which last two weeks, are organised in collaboration with partners. The course fee is currently set at US$1,500 - board and lodging not included.

Courses start on the second Monday of the second month of each quarter. Courses may be cancelled if the minimum number of five participants cannot be met.
Contact Ralph Houtman for further information.

To support the training activities of financial institutions and particularly the important shift of emphasis towards encouraging savings, the FAO Rural Finance Group has produced two videos.

1. Safeguarding Deposits
2. Little Money, Big Vision

Please go to the Videos page for further information.

A major part of Group's work in the field of training is implemented in collaboration with the RACAs. The use of resources in developing countries themselves is maximised by following the principle of technical cooperation among developing countries (TCDC). Other RACA activities include organisation of national and sub-regional training courses, senior management workshops and seminars, study tours for senior management and staff exchange programmes for middle management personnel. They also publish periodic newsletters and technical reports. For further information about the RACAs please go to the Regional Agricultural Credit Associations page.

Agricultural Production Lending
This toolkit is designed as a guidebook and training resource for agricultural lending institutions around the globe. It is not country or institution specific but rather highlights the common principles of sound agricultural lending practices. It is intended for use by trainers or as self-study material for loan officers. The practical approach of the toolkit is enhanced by the use of an imaginary institution to illustrate important steps of the loan cycle and loan portfolio management and the client perspective is represented by an imaginary farm household.

Agricultural Production Lending is a joint publication by GTZ and FAO. An edited downloadable version of the first three chapters is available in the Rural Finance Learning Centre. Go to...

Enhancing Farmers' Financial Management Skills
This book, which is No. 6 in the Agricultural Finance Revisited series, focuses on the issue of improving farmer's financial management skills. For details please go to the Agricultural Finance Revisited page.

Talking About Money
Field officers involved in giving agricultural advice in developing countries are most commonly technical experts of some kind, e.g. agronomists, livestock, irrigation or engineering specialists. They usually do not have much experience in giving advice about money and this topic is generally avoided, apart perhaps from some simplified profit calculations. This series of booklets will help them "talk about money" more readily and enable them to give good advice to farmers about the use of financial services such as credit. The material is designed to be useful not only to extension or advisory officers involved in agricultural or rural development but also to farmer discussion groups and farmer field schools.

The first book in the series is entitled "Explaining cash flow and savings". It is available in English, French and Spanish and is accompanied by separate files containing copies of the planning forms introduced in the text, which can therefore be printed out and used as required.

Training Guide
In 1998 the Rural Finance Group contracted four consultants from different regions and disciplines to review content and approaches to training in rural finance. This guide was the result of that work and it explores the training issues that need to be addressed at three levels - policy makers, financial institutions and clients. The report concludes with a preliminary attempt to outline key topics in which training materials could be developed to support the probable training needs of the different levels of actors.

Management of rural income-generating activities
This booklet, which was developed jointly by the Rural Finance Group and the Gender and Population Division, is based on FAO project experiences in French-speaking African countries. It is intended to provide extension workers and group leaders with a simple guide to teaching financial management to individuals and groups. The booklet shows how to introduce to people the nature of rural income-generating activities and the essential elements of financial management. It gives simple examples of the main types of financial records a business needs and explains the different ways a business can be financed.

Glossary of terms for agricultural insurance and rural finance
This glossary was published as FAO Agricultural Services Bulletin No. 100 in 1992. It provides a useful reference tool for researchers, teachers and practitioners in the field of rural finance and will be reviewed and up-dated in the near future.

To order or download any of these publications, please go to our publications page.

Some publications produced by other Services within FAO have relevance to capacity building in rural finance, e.g.