Innovative Governance Framework for Global Islamic Microfinance Institutions

Abstract

This paper examines the best practices of innovative global Islamic micro finance governance in relations to independence, competency, confidentiality and consistency and shariah compliance issues. An innovative framework to support the Islamic microfinance institutions in discharging its duties in matters relating to Shariah was formulated within the context of the governance of Shariah Islamic microfinance among Islamic microfinance institutions in Malaysia. The governance model supports the robustness of the Grameen model.   Initial investigation revealed that specific policies oriented towards the start-up and growth of innovative higher-growth enterprise was lacking. Although these institutions are able to point out a number of good examples of governance initiatives, however these examples generally not the outcome of a cohesive integrated IMFI’s policy framework. Thus, there is an urgent need for the researchers to propose and develop innovative framework that examines the current best practices of global Islamic micro finance governance.

Keywords— Global Islamic micro finance, Shariah, Islamic microfinance institutions, Governance; Malaysia