Aflatoun International

Who We Are:

Aflatoun International is an NGO based in Amsterdam, the Netherlands offering social and financial education to children and young people worldwide. Through a strong network of 275 partners, the organization reaches nearly 9 million children and young people each year in more than 100 countries. Aflatoun creates high-quality curricula - which aims to harness the personal, interpersonal, financial, and entrepreneurial skills of children and the youth - and can be contextualized to local needs or specific circumstances. Aflatoun’s range of age-specific, activity-based curricula educates children about interpersonal skills, child rights, financial savings and enterprise. Aflatoun achieves this by improving the capacity of teacher-educators to use child-centered learning and active learning methods both in and out of school. Beyond promoting the integration of social and financial education for children and the youth into both formal and informal curricula, Aflatoun also supports small youth-led community projects and financial enterprises, and provides technical support to our partner organizations and to governments on contextualizing, implementing, monitoring and evaluating, and scaling up social and financial education.

Our Mission:

Aflatoun International’s mission is to ensure access to inclusive social and financial education for all children and young people globally, especially the most vulnerable. Aflatoun believes that economic empowerment begins with the provision of children and young people with the technical skills, knowledge, and resources necessary to thrive in their communities and lead healthy lives.

A Brief History
Aflatoun was conceived in Mumbai, India in 1991 as an action research project launched by Jeroo Billimoria, with the aim of creating a space where children across all economic classes could meet and learn about each other’s lives. With the increase of rural-to-urban migration, ethnic tensions and child labor, the project grew into a space for children to harness their energy and creativity, as well as learn about money and savings to improve their prospects in life. Aflatoun started growing in response to the lack of opportunities to gain quality financial management and social awareness skills for children and young people. Aflatoun International formally came into being and its global journey began in 2005, when Aflatoun (Child Savings International) was established in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Since then, as one of the leading non-profit organizations in this domain, Aflatoun International has been offering social and financial education to children and young people worldwide, empowering them to make a positive change for a more equitable world. To learn more, visit Aflatoun’s website (aflatoun.org) and our Global Social and Financial Skills Conference microsite (https://www.aflatoun.org/gsfsc2019/)