Optimizing Financial Services& Making Them Affordable
Outtakes from the SIDFS International Financial Inclusion Conference 2019. With Dinesh Rath, CEO, Lagos Trade Free Zone, Tolaram Group
Fireside Chat – How FSPs Can Increase Their Market Penetration
In spite of several financial inclusion campaigns and interventions, financial service providers (FSPs) still struggle to extend their services to financial excluded Nigerians (about 36.6 million adults). What is the missing link? During a fireside chat with Mr Dinesh Rathi (CEO, Lagos Free Trade Zone, Tolaram Group) at the 2019 International Financial Inclusion Conference, we […]
Fireside Chat – How Can We Resolve The Non-consumption of Financial Services In Nigeria?
Non-consumption is the inability of a person or organization to purchase and use a product or service required to fulfill an important job. This inability arises from a series of constraints such as market affordability (cost), institutional voids or complexities (enabling environment) or resource or scarcity (convenience) and the like. At the 2019 International Financial […]
Financial Inclusion and the Frugality of Mobile Money for the BOP
Mobile money and digital financial services are frugal innovations and proven vehicles for providing and deepening access to formal financial services among the unbanked and underserved citizens. What is a frugal product and how does mobile money fit into this description? To be frugal means to be efficient at adding value amidst scarce resources. Frugal […]
Financial inclusion, a sustainable pathway to empowering women
Attaining the Sustainable Development Goals is one of the most ambitious projects on the planet. A project of immense scale and unfathomable impact, it is no surprise that several experts have doubted the possibility of ever attaining them. Why? For one, the SDGs are severely underfunded as the estimated budget is $USD 5–7 trillion, and […]
COVID-19 and MONEY
Monitoring the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the financial service industry We’re all going to remember this coronavirus pandemic a bit differently. Students are at home, churches and mosques are empty, international travel is at a historic low, medical resources are stretched thin and some countries are on lockdown. The coronavirus pandemic is rocking the […]
For Nigeria’s poor, Covid-19 is just one out of a myriad of life hazards
For Nigeria’s poor, Covid-19 is just one of a myriad of life hazards As the entire planet battles against the rage of the coronavirus pandemic, the world’s poor remain evermore vulnerable. And in a country like Nigeria where 50 percent of the near 200 million population already live below the poverty line, getting infected with the […]
Financial inclusion: a low-hanging fruit for post Covid-19 economic recovery and growth in Nigeria
Covid-19 is the sci-fi sounding name given to the latest coronavirus from Wuhan, China. What is now clear is that early warning systems, response protocols, international and national response preparedness and institutions are either unavailable or painfully embryonic. Inevitably, the contagion spread, mainly through global aviation, tourism and even diplomatic activity. In Nigeria, there was […]
Digitised Banking: Greater DFS Innovation Needed to Adequately Decongest Banking Halls
With financial service providers taking major steps to protect staff and customers from COVID-19, this should be the finest moment for DFS! After four weeks of being ‘locked down’ at the directive of the President, the cities of Lagos and the FCT sprang back to life at the lifting of the lockdown. What no one […]
COVID-19 and SDGs: How the pandemic impacts attainment of the SDGs
The COVID-19 pandemic is a major hitch in the attainment of the SDGs, but how bad are we hit? The pandemic impediment to attaining the SDGs The United Nations 2030 Agenda for sustainable development is perhaps the most ambitious agenda on the planet. The 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aim to produce a better world for humanity […]