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MPTF COVID: Healthy Socio-Economic Recovery of the Micro and Small Enterprise Sector of Sri Lanka (COVID-19) - Final joint evaluation

eval_number:

3301

eval_url:

https://webapps.ilo.org/ievaldiscovery/eval/3301

lessons_learned:

themes:

theme:

Global supply/value chains

category:

Enterprises

---

comments:

ILO Country Office, ILO DWT and HQ, and ILO EVAL.

challenges:

Such a grant from the project is neither sustainable, nor adhering to the principle of impartiality. It is not sustainable, because in the present intervention a grant was provided to 93 MSEs (already amounting to 18% of IO’s project resources), but to upscale this activity would require large amounts of funds. The principle of impartiality is at stake because the grants are provided to MSEs operating in well-established value chains, while other more vulnerable MSEs are left out.

success:

Apart from supporting suppliers to continue their business, such a model could well generate additional jobs. The CBSL expressed their desire to explore this model further and is keen to adopt it. This component, while being a pilot approach, was in itself successful with 93 suppliers being provided with potentially enterprise-saving loans, and at the same time acquiring lots of learning-while-doing. Replication could well be possible if it could be implemented without the project grant.

context:

The delay in convincing the large buyers to provide loans to their suppliers triggered the project to top up the loan to MSEs with a grant of the same amount. Subsequently four buyers were found willing to invest.

description:

Both Direct and Indirect Value Chain Financing (VCF) was found less suitable for an immediate response project with a short implementation time barring the pilot approach employed here. The project attempted to follow-up indirect VCF but was not successful as it would have taken too much time to convince the banks and other financial institutions to become directly involved. The same can be said of the direct VCF approach employed in the project on a pilot basis: it also took time to convince the large buyers to become really involved and make available their own funds for loans to MSE suppliers to make sure that they continue their work and that the value chain kept on functioning.

administrative_issues:

More details on the VCF component from the Beneficiaries’ point of view are provided in Annex 9.

url:

https://webapps.ilo.org/ievaldiscovery/lessons/245990

---

location:

country:

Sri Lanka

region:

Asia and the Pacific

---

eval_title:

MPTF COVID: Healthy Socio-Economic Recovery of the Micro and Small Enterprise Sector of Sri Lanka (COVID-19) - Final joint evaluation