The solutions for digital cash in Afghanistan exist, but the consumer culture does not, yet. However, security, access and liquidity concerns, require these solutions for delivering humanitarian assistance.
Project overview
Hesabpay provides digital cash-based transfers to vulnerable communities, enabling them to have their own digital accounts to cash out directly or do cashless transactions in hundreds of merchants.
The challenge
The solution
HesabPay, a local fintech solution, transparently delivers digital Afghanis to any mobile phone number and network. HesabPay wallets provide vulnerable communities that WFP assists with their own financial accounts. From standing in long distribution lines for cash, to being empowered with a financial account to save or redeem their assistance in cash or cashless transactions at a local merchant network of over 1,000 merchants in Afghanistan, and growing. HesabPay empowers women to participate in the local economy, redeeming their assistance at nearby local merchants. HesabPay also increases WFP assurance of cash-assistance by enabling reporting of irreversible real-time payments backed by blockchain.
Impact
Following a successful three-month pilot in Kabul, which served 13,777 people and received positive feedback, the solution expanded to reach more than 7,000 households in the eastern region of the country.
Digital accounts are now being integrated into the World Bank’s Social Safety Net (SSN) and scaled as part of WFP's Resilience and Emergency portfolio in Afghanistan. Hesabpay has been expanded to a rural area of the country, promoting the financial inclusion of the local population.
“Investing in women means achieving long and lasting multiplier effect on their families and communities. Women have a central role in social dynamics and are a source of social cohesion.”
Alejandra Rivera-Stapper, Innovation and Market Development Lead at WFP Afghanistan
Last updated:
28/11/2024
