Country Visits

Her Majesty Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development (UNSGSA), visited Ethiopia on 14-15 May to discuss how the nation could embrace financial inclusion as a priority and help achieve the UN Sustainable Development… Read more

Her Majesty Queen Máxima will be visiting the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan from the evening of Sunday 10 to Tuesday 12 February in her capacity as the UN Secretary-General's Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development. At the end of 2017, under the leadership of the Central Bank of Jordan… Read more

India has made tremendous strides in expanding access to financial services, thanks in large part to its robust digital infrastructure. The proportion of adults with a formal account more than doubled between 2011 and 2017, from 35 to 80 percent. Read more

Indonesia has reached a critical junction in its efforts to advance financial inclusion. Since the launch of its national financial inclusion strategy in 2016, the network of agents has expanded rapidly and the government has made significant progress in implementing digital government-to-person… Read more

Queen Máxima speaking at the UN during her previous visit to Indonesia in 2016. Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development (UNSGSA), will visit Indonesia to explore progress and… Read more

The last time the Special Advocate visited Nigeria, in 2012, the country had just launched its national financial inclusion strategy, which laid out a goal of achieving 80 percent financial inclusion by 2020. Since then, Nigeria has made significant progress in a number of areas. Nearly half the… Read more

Maria Teresa Gaytan Lopez, who met the Special Advocate while opening her first bank account at an OXXO convenience store in Mexico City, with Oscar Osorio Martinez, a regular customer. Over the past several years, Mexico has taken steps to modernize its… Read more

Within just one generation, Viet Nam has undergone an extraordinary transformation from being one of the world’s poorest nations to achieving lower-middle-income status. While financial inclusion has also increased sharply, the majority of Vietnamese still do… Read more

Flag of Viet Nam. The UN Secretary-General's Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development, H.M. Majesty Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, will visit Viet Nam from 30 May through 1 June 2017 to explore paths to progress on financial inclusion. Viet… Read more

The Special Advocate often observes that financial inclusion is a universal issue, one that needs to be addressed in every country. The situation in Argentina illustrates her point with great clarity. Although Argentina is a middle-income country with the third-largest economy in Latin America,… Read more

Flag of Argentina. From Tuesday 11 to Wednesday 12 October Her Majesty Queen Máxima of the Netherlands will visit Argentina in her role as the UN Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development (UNSGSA). In the capital Buenos… Read more

Indonesia’s dynamic growth over the last 15 years has helped cut poverty in more than half. Still, 40 percent linger right above the poverty line, their economic prospects in need of further protection. To build further on this progress, the government has made a commitment to extend financial… Read more