Fayda is promoting inclusivity and economic participation for the country’s minorities and closing the world-sized gap with Western norms. Fayda is empowering women by enabling access to social protection payments, bank accounts, and loans, thereby enhancing their participation in the economy. It also offers legal identification to over 1 million refugees and millions of internally displaced persons (IDPs), facilitating their access to essential services and economic opportunities.
Launched in 2024, the World Bank-supported Ethiopia Digital ID for Inclusion and Services Project aims to provide accessible digital IDs to 90 million people, including refugees, ensuring all legal residents in Ethiopia can access basic services. As of February 2025, over 12 million people have been registered, with numbers expected to grow significantly. With only 15% of women holding an ID, the diffusion of digital ID between men and women is starkly different and women are not prioritised during physical registration. The Fayda ID project aims to mobilise community, partnerships with womens’ groups and train female registration officers to increase the pre-registration of more women for national ID at in-person facilities.
“Fayda is more than just a digital ID; it’s a gateway to a brighter future, opening doors to economic opportunity, financial inclusion, and social protection for millions of Ethiopians…” – Maryam Salim, World Bank Division Director for Eritrea, Ethiopia, South Sudan and Sudan
“Through this system, women, refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), the homeless, and other marginalized communities now have the necessities to rebuild their lives and integrate fully into society”.
Refugees, many of whom have expired ID cards, have an integrated support system connecting them to services across Ethiopia through technical interoperability.
For Internally Displaced People, Fayda offers a game-changing solution. Many displaced individuals lack personal documents, making access to services difficult, but the open-source platform ‘OpenG2P’ delivers social benefits directly to vulnerable communities.
The transformative power of unlocking essential services to these marginalized groups is inspiring other African nations to improve inclusion for their national ID systems.
