This case study documents learning from Fondation Zakoura Microcredit's (FZMC, or Zakoura) “Expanding Financial Services to Vulnerable Youth in Morocco,” or LYKOM (which means “for you” in Arabic), project.

From 2006–2009, Save the Children and Fondation Zakoura Micro-Crédit (Zakoura) partnered to implement a youth financial services and livelihoods promotion project called “Linking Youth with Knowledge and Opportunities in Microfinance,” or LYKOM. The program included financial and business literacy training, savings promotion, and access to credit for youth businesses. This case study examines the challenges Save the Children and Zakoura faced and the ways the institutions sought to address these challenges.

This expert post from executive director Jeroo Billimoria explains why Aflatoun chose a campaign as the growth and expansion strategy for their social and financial education programme, and what the benefits of this approach have been to date.

Can children manage money? How can they best be taught the importance of saving money and other resources? These are questions Aflatoun is answering through its Campaign for Social and Financial Education. From its 2008 launch in Amsterdam by Princess Maxima of the Netherland, the UN Secretary-General's Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development, the campaign has pursued one key goal: to provide high quality social and financial education to 1 million children in 75 countries by the end of 2010.

Save the Children and Fondation Zakoura Microcredit (FZMC) are implementing the “Linking Youth with Knowledge and Opportunities in Microfinance,” or LYKOM (which means “for you” in Arabic), project with seed funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and cofinanced with private funding from Save the Children and FZMC. The program includes financial and business literacy training; savings promotion; and access to credit for youth businesses.

Lessons learned include:

Aflatoun is a Dutch non-profit organization focused on social and financial education for children between the ages of 6-14 years. The Aflatoun program is currently operational in 22 countries reaching over 500,000 children (approximately 200,000 of which have started either individual or group savings accounts), and program materials have been translated into 11 languages.

As we’ve grown, we have struggled to find a meaningful, accurate and cost-reasonable way of measuring our work and our impacts. That process is the subject of this post.