Today, we're sitting with Papa Amadou who is the Minister, General Delegate for Entrepreneurship in Senegal, an initiative called the DER.

The DER is a fund of 30 billion FCFA ($50 million USD) launched by the President of Senegal to catalyze entrepreneurship all around [Senegal](https://www.ictworks.org/tag/Senegal/), targeting youth up to 40 years and women from 18 years old and up, with no age limit.

Announced in Sept 2017 and formally launched in April 2018, the fund offers four main types of [entrepreneur financing](https://www.ictworks.org/funding-sources-african-entrepreneurs/). The most innovative are the latter two:

1. Small Financing: focusing on “smaller, simple economic projects”

2. Incubation funding: funding incubation, empowerment, or training programs for young entrepreneurs

3. Equity financing: a corporate finance fund that will offer capital in exchange for equity in a young company, that is validated by external DER partners

4. Low-interest loans: at 4-5% interest rate with a specific focus on certain clustered economic activities or certain value chains