A MERGER BUILT ON SHARED VALUES
Complementary skills and knowledge that serve to build resilience and boost economic and technological development in disadvantaged rural areas.
Two pioneering organizations
CIDR and Pamiga are two pioneers of sustainable economic development in sub-Saharan Africa. CIDR (International Centre for Development and Research) has spent over 50 years devising socio-economic development programmes tailored to local and national contexts.
Pamiga has been providing technical and financial services to advise and support participatory microfinance institutions for over 15 years. In December 2019, CIDR and Pamiga merged to create a new organization: CIDR Pamiga.
Shared vision
The two organizations share the same vision of economic development, so they decided to join forces and together pursue the goal of bringing disadvantaged rural areas into the 21st century. Their underlying belief? That collaboration with local economic actors and digital development will be the keys to virtuous, inclusive and sustainable development.
New range of services
CIDR Pamiga has drawn on these synergies to develop a new range of services that centre on providing support for impact funds and digital economic ecosystems. The organization’s core expertise, designing development programmes for financial institutions and local government, is now being implemented everywhere that economic and climate resilience in needed: in Africa, South America and Asia.
Four pilot projects are programmed for 2020-2021, including one currently being rolled out in Ivory Coast centring on the value chain for cashew nuts.
“The merger between CIDR and Pamiga is the fruit of long reflection, and is welcomed enthusiastically by all our staff. The two organizations share very strong values. We have always fought for projects that deliver progress on the ground first and foremost. This shared energy is what unites us, helping us to make 1 + 1 = 3.”
Rénée Chao-Beroff – CIDR Pamiga Managing Director
About CIDR
The International Centre for Development and Research (CIDR) is a not-for-profit organization under the terms of the French law of 1 July 1901. It was founded on 13 June 1961 with a mission to study, formulate, support and implement socio–economic development programmes in France and internationally at local, regional and national levels and in ways that respect local people’s socio-cultural balance. To meet this goal, CIDR studies, designs, supports and implements development actions and programmes and provides them with technical, administrative, legal and financial support, helps with training and/or coordinates the activities of project staff, and assesses and capitalizes on methodologies used by the operations and programmes.
About pamiga
The Participatory Microfinance Group for Africa (PAMIGA) is a not-for-profit organization under the terms of the French law of 1 July 1901. It was founded on 24 October 2005 with a mission to contribute to the growth of microfinance in Africa and lasting improvement to the living conditions of disadvantaged people in rural communities and small towns by providing access to sustainable and good quality financial services. To meet this goal, the organization provides a network of successful African participatory microfinance institutions seeking to expand their reach with technical institutional capacity-building services, financial services for strengthening working capital, and services for establishing relations with banks and investors in the northern and southern hemispheres.
50 years of innovation and partnership
Created in 1961, the International Centre for Development and Research studies, designs and implements socio-economic development programmes that respect local people’s socio-cultural choices.
It has published a book retracing a half-century of experiences, innovations and partnerships and illustrating the CIDR’s history and development.
