Cooperativa de Ahorro y Préstamo Tosepantomin, a Mexican savings and home loan products institution, has won the European Microfinance Award for housing at a ceremony held at the European Investment Bank (EIB) in Luxembourg headquarters.
The firm, also referred to as Tosepantomin, helps Mexican communities in marginalised areas of the country finance house building projects with technical support to ensures affordable home loans as well as ecofriendly building techniques.
Werner Hoyer, president of the EIB, told an audience at the event that the number of people living in substandard housing exceeds 1.5 million.
He added: “The microfinance sector, which responds to the needs of the financially excluded, is heeding the call to provide housing loans to low-income groups unserved by the traditional financial sector.”
This year’s winner emerged among 37 microfinance contenders from 23 developing countries, each of which competed in the housing finance category. The European Microfinance Awards is held annually with the goal of recognising institutions that support people’s access to basic goods and services in the poorest countries. Following this year’s theme, contenders were selected for their focus on groups in developing countries that subsist within a low-income bracket, or who have limited access to housing finance.
Tosepantomin also received a cash prize of €100,000 from the directorate for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Affairs of Luxembourg’s ministry of foreign and European affairs.
For the first time, award finalists Mibanco, a financial service platform from Peru, and the First Microfinance Bank of Afghanistan, each received €10,000.
Romain Schneider, minister for development cooperation and humanitarian affairs and member of the grand jury for the event, commented that this year’s winner: “does not only adopt a holistic approach to the multiple housing issues, but also promotes environmental responsibility in a truly remarkable way.”