1997 – Birth of an idea: the origins of PlaNet Finance.

It was while taking part in a seminar at the Aspen Institute in November 1997 that Jacques Attali outlined his plan for creating a virtual bank for refinancing microfinance institutions. He proposed calling it PlaNet Bank. (Read Jacques Attali’s Speech at the Aspen Institute).

Around the same time Arnaud Ventura, who was in Argentina as Head of New Technologies within the Banque Nationale de Paris in Buenos Aires, became interested in how new technologies could help Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) to develop and grow. In October 1997 he set up NGO-NET, an NGO dedicated to using the internet and new information and communication technologies (NICTs) to strengthen the capacity of NGOs in sectors such as health, education and microfinance.

Jacques Attali then got in touch with Arnaud Ventura and, in December 1997, gave him the job of drawing up PlaNet Finance’s first Business Plan and to set out the services the organisation would offer.

As the organisation started to take shape, Arnaud Ventura brought together many colleagues (mainly via the internet) to join in the process of defining its role and activities. In February 1998 Jacques Attali discussed the proposed project with Michel Rocard (former French Prime Minister and member of the European Parliament), Muhammad Yunus (founder and President of the Grameen Bank) and Massimo Ponzellini (who was then Vice-President of the European Investment Bank). They gave their support and were invited to join the organisation’s proposed governing body.

In May 1998, a pilot programme was established in East Africa under the Arnaud Ventura’s leadership. Its aim was to get a better understanding of the needs of those involved in microfinance. The programme, and the work of the many experts who contributed to it, led to the creation of PlaNet Finance on October 13th 1998 (as a non-profit organisation recognised under French law).

From the start, PlaNet Finance was supported by the private sector; with many companies adding to the financing that it had received from international sponsors. PlaNet Finance’s initial supporters were DEXIA, Cap Gemini, the intergovernmental French language organisation la Francophonie, (which offered support through its information highway funding programme known as Fonds Francophone des Inforoutes), the World Bank (through its Information for Development Programme InfoDev) and private benefactors.

It was then that PlaNet Finance was established as an international NGO with the aim of developing microfinance in the fight against poverty.

PlaNet Finance’s ambition is to become a platform for bringing together those involved in the microfinance sector, while developing practical tools with the potential for furthering the aims of microfinance. In the first instance, PlaNet Finance’s actions focused on the following three main areas:

1.Technical assistance, advice and training for those involved in microfinance – such as Microfinance Institutions, NGOs, Cooperatives, Banks or Financial Institutions, Governments or Central Banks.

2. Assessing and rating Microfinance Institutions.

3. Financing Microfinance Institutions.

PlaNet Finance’s services in each of these three fields soon started to take shape, with the creation of rating activities under Planet Rating in 1999, and through technical support (under PlaNet Systems, as it was then called).

PlaNet Finance’s international network gradually started to be built up, with PlaNet Finance’s first branch being established in Benin in 1999 (on the initiative of Gilles Galludec, an expert who had been associated with PlaNet Finance from its very start). This was quickly followed in 2000 by the creation of PlaNet Finance India (prompted by Xavier Bertrand, a PlaNet Finance supporter in India).

Having started off as a simple proposal back in 1997, PlaNet Finance continues to grow every day, serving a growing number of players in the microfinance field. Through this, it contributes to the development of microfinance throughout the world.