The Group of 20 and Ashoka’s Changemakers, with support from the Rockefeller Foundation, are looking for the best models worldwide that catalyze finance for small and medium enterprises (SMEs). This challenge is open to all private sector participants, including private financial institutions, private investors and companies, socially responsible investors, foundations, and civil society organizations.

Submit your solution, or nominate a project, to the G-20 SME Finance Challenge for how public finance can unlock private finance to small and medium enterprise on a sustainable and scalable basis. The goal of the Challenge is to identify catalytic and well-targeted public interventions to unlock private finance for SMEs. Maximizing leverage of scarce public resources is at the core of the Challenge.

Submit your entry by the early entry deadline, 6:00 PM EDT, August 6, 2010, and be eligible to win the US $1,000 Early Entry Prize provided by Ashoka’s Changemakers. The final competition deadline is August 25, 2010.

Up to 15 winners will be invited to the November 2010 G-20 Summit in Korea to be recognized for their innovative ideas. Winners will then be connected with donors and investors at an SME conference in Germany following the Korea Summit.

The G-20 is collectively committed to mobilizing the public share of the funding needed to implement winning proposals from development banks and interested bilateral donors. IFC and the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank Group, the African Development Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development have all indicated their support for implementing scalable and sustainable SME financing proposals, including those from the Challenge, in partnership with the private sector.

Proposals should address one or more of these objectives:

1. Catalyzing debt finance for SMEs (e. g., local bank lending, supply chain finance, debt issuance) along with related financial services;
2. Mobilizing equity or quasi-equity investments in SMEs;
3. Building the capacity of financial institutions, related financial infrastructure, and any technical finance-related SME assistance needs;
4. Developing regulatory and policy best practices that facilitate SME finance;
5.  Addressing gaps in financial market infrastructure to reduce search costs for creditworthy SMEs with growth and profit potential;
6. Expanding SME finance access in fragile and weak states; and
7. Addressing the particular barriers confronting women entrepreneurs seeking SME finance.

Click here to to submit your entry and for more information.  Be sure to Download an entry form to preview and prepare your answers before submitting them online.