Uganda Country Assessment on Affordable and Accessible Remittances for Forcibly Displaced Persons and Host Communities

Although the market for providing remittance services to refugees is large, financial service providers have found it difficult to develop a business case for targeting them. The cost of reaching and ensuring liquidity at remote locations, uncertainty regarding acceptable identification, and lack of information about refugees' needs and abilities have limited the business case. As such, many refugees depend on expensive, ad-hoc and sometimes risky solutions to overcome legal and logistical challenges to accessing remittance services. There is an opportunity for development agencies to intervene by supporting remittance and financial service providers, and influencing the policy environment to make serving refugees feasible and commercially viable.

The Uganda country assessment provides an overview of the demand, supply and regulatory constraints that forcibly displaced persons (FDPs) face, especially when accessing formal remittance channels. The report presents key situation findings and reflections from a diverse set of stakeholders that support humanitarian and development agencies to determine:

• Ways to improve access to affordable and reliable regulated remittance services.
• Whether or not there is a viable business case to link remittances to broader financial services such as credit, savings, insurance, or payment.