The United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) makes public and private finance work for the poor in the world’s 47 least developed countries. With its capital mandate and instruments, UNCDF offers “last mile” finance models that unlock public and private resources, especially at the domestic level, to reduce poverty and support local economic development.

Leaving no one behind in the digital era

UNCDF has formulated its strategy ‘Leaving no one behind in the digital era’ based on over a decade of experience in digital finance in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. UNCDF recognizes that reaching the full potential of digital financial inclusion in support of the Sustainable Development Goals aligns with the vision of promoting and financing digital economies that leave no one behind. The vision of UNCDF is to empower millions of people by 2024 to use services daily that leverage innovation and technology and contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals.

Project Description

UNCDF has launched a new initiative whose main aim is to build capacity and technical readiness of MFIs and SACCOs in preparation for integration into the forthcoming Tanzania Instant Payments Systems (TIPS).

Tanzania Instant Payments System (TIPS) is a national interoperable payments system being developed by the Bank of Tanzania to facilitate real-time payments across all financial service providers in the country thereby enhancing financial inclusion by promoting the use of electronic payments and transactions.

UNCDF is looking to open source software technology partner with experience in implementing inclusive payment systems and integration solutions. Applicants shall have the capability to deploy a real time payment system and train aggregators and financial service providers to integrate and support real world integration and inter-operability scenarios.

This project will support MFIs and SACCOs based in Tanzania to integrate to TIPS. The scope of the project and its impact to beneficiaries/clients is nation-wide.

UNCDF will provide a grant to the most suitable organization/consortium up to a maximum amount of US$ 310,000 to support the implementation of a real-time payment platform lab for MFIs and other digital financial services providers (DFSPs) in order to enable payments and to train them.

The selected applicant will sign a Performance-Based Agreement (PBA) with UNCDF. UNCDF will only select one applicant to implement the solution.

Inquiries to this request for applications may be submitted by email to uncdf.rfa@uncdf.org no later the 5 October 2020.

All applications must be submitted via email by 17:00 (EST, the New York time zone) on 12 26 October 2020 to uncdf.rfa@uncdf.org