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Good practice Imported

Women Entrepreneurs Leveraging Innovative Finance in Tonga (WE-LIFT)

Tonga · Nuku'alofa · See the Tonga profile · See the Nuku'alofa profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 83% 52/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

A $9M ADB grant approved in December 2025 is building Tonga's first risk-sharing facility -- an 80% partial credit guarantee up to T$300,000 per loan -- plus an enablement fund and business advisory hub to move informal women-led MSMEs into formal, growth-oriented businesses.

Women Entrepreneurs Leveraging Innovative Finance in Tonga (WE-LIFT)

Details

Maturity
Pilot
Promoter
Ministry of Commerce, Consumer Trade, Innovation and Labour, Kingdom of Tonga — financed by the Asian Development Bank
Period
2025-ongoing
Keywords
women entrepreneurship, SME finance, credit guarantee, financial inclusion, business formalisation

Context

Women Entrepreneurs Leveraging Innovative Finance in Tonga (WE-LIFT) is a $9 million grant from the Asian Development Bank's Asian Development Fund (SDG 5: Transformative Gender Agenda pool), approved on 16 December 2025 and executed by Tonga's Ministry of Commerce, Consumer Trade, Innovation and Labour.

Objectives

It is designed to move informal women-led micro, small and medium enterprises into formal, growth-oriented businesses by easing the collateral and interest-rate barriers that keep them small.

Activities

The grant establishes Tonga's first risk-sharing facility, guaranteeing up to 80% of loan principal to ease bank collateral requirements, with a maximum guaranteed loan size of T$300,000 (about US$126,450). An enablement fund offers grants to improve the bankability of informal MSMEs, and a business advisory hub delivers tailored business development services plus financial and digital skills training. The rationale, per ADB's own regional private-sector assessment, is that Tonga's financial sector applies real interest rates of roughly 15–18% with short loan terms and limited acceptance of collateral.

Conclusions

Approved only in December 2025, WE-LIFT is ADB's first finance-sector project dedicated to women entrepreneurs in Tonga. It has not yet disbursed loans or published outcome data — the risk-sharing facility and enablement fund are new institutional mechanisms for the country with no track record yet, so this is a design and funding commitment worth watching rather than a proven result.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k) — Total grant of US$9 million financing the risk-sharing facility, enablement fund and advisory hub.
Time to results
Medium (1–3 years) — Approved December 2025; too new to assess a delivery timeline against.
Staffing & skills
Executed by Tonga's Ministry of Commerce, Consumer Trade, Innovation and Labour, Financed by the Asian Development Bank's Asian Development Fund

Conditions for success

  • An 80% partial credit guarantee is designed to ease bank collateral requirements that currently exclude informal MSMEs
  • Combines the credit guarantee with a grant-based enablement fund and a business advisory hub, rather than finance alone

Common failure modes

  • Approved only in December 2025; the risk-sharing facility and enablement fund are new institutional mechanisms for Tonga with no track record yet, and no loans have been disbursed or outcome data published

Where it fits

Governance type
national government programme, multilateral-bank financed
Scale
national

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