Capacity building plays a critical role in enabling financial institutions to more effectively serve and reach certain client groups, such as SMEs. The African Development Bank’s (AfDB) African Private Sector Assistance Fund provided a grant to the Tunisian SME bank Banque de Financement des Petites et Moyennes Entreprises (BFPME) to strengthen the communication, management and technical banking skills of all its managers and staff.

IPC worked with BFPME to develop and implement blended training programmes consisting of an innovative online learning platform with e-learning modules, online testing and classroom training. IPC particularly focused on training to improve the financial analysis skills of frontline lending staff, such as account managers, business analysts, credit analysts and regional branch managers.  The training and blended learning structure established will promote the further development of access to finance for SMEs at BFPME.