The Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest (CGAP) is a consortium of 28 public and private development agencies working together to expand access to financial services for the poor in developing countries. CGAP traces its roots to a June 1994 Donor Working Group meeting in Paris. Subsequently, nine donors came together to establish the CGAP in 1995. Funding and administration of CGAP was sought from the World Bank, which approved a US$30m grant from the Special Grants Program in March 1995 for an initial three year period (Phase I). Following a 1998 mid-course review, the members of the Consultative Group renewed CGAP for an additional five-year period through 2003 (Phase II). After a second CGAP evaluation took place in 2002, the Consultative Group authorized Phase III for a further five-year period beginning July 2003.

Its current objective is to support the development of financial systems that work for the poor, by improving the capacity of microfinance institutions to deliver flexible, high-quality financial services to the poor on a sustainable basis. Four major activities during Phases I and II have been: (1) disseminating microfinance best practices, (2) grants to selected microfinance institutions (MFIs) to spur learning and innovation, (3) mainstreaming microfinance within member donor agencies, and (4) fostering national policy environments conducive to microfinance. CGAP has a permanent staff of 23 people based in Washington, D.C., and Paris, and operates on an annual budget of $10 million.