Through helping our partners and microfinance clients acccess their loan details on a digital platform, the BAVku mobile banking app is helping women in Indonesia have easy access to their finances.

As life for families and entrepreneurs in Indonesia moved online in 2021, Opportunity International Australia expanded a program to address the digital readiness of our partners and develop digital strategies – enabling them to use the most appropriate technology to better meet the needs of families living in poverty. Our partners have started trialling mobile digital technology that will increase efficiencies, reduce transactional costs and allow us to scale and expand into more remote areas.

Our microfinance partner Bina Artha (BAV) has built a mobile app for customer engagement and support, called BAVku. The app gives women accessing small loans a sense of ownership and the ability to check their loan details and balance, give feedback, check out product offerings, apply for a loan and access customer support.

The app has already been piloted with women in Indonesia, and feedback being used to improve the support women can access through the platform. Opportunity will also facilitate the sharing of knowledge and learnings from this app with our other local partners in Indonesia. Ultimately, digital technology also has the potential to identify the obstacles being faced by families living in poverty and their communities and help link them to service providers to overcome these barriers.

This program is supported by the Australian Government through the Australian NGO Cooperation Program (ANCP).