The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has said that 46.3 percent of Nigeria's population is still financially excluded compared to South Africa, Kenya and Bostwana with 26.0 per cent, 32.7 per cent and 33.0 per cent, respectively.
The CBN Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi made the remarks yesterday in Abuja at the 6th edition of the annual microfinance conference and entrepreneurship award with the theme: "Re-focusing Microfinance for Entrepreneurship Development in Nigeria."
He said that as at December, 2011, there were 24 deposit money banks with 5,789 branches and 816 microfinance banks bringing the total bank branches to 6,605. He added that the ratio of bank branch to the total population is 24, 224 persons which indicates a high level of financial exclusion.
He explained that in order to address the challenge, the CBN has undertaken a number of strategic initiatives which include revision of the Microfinance Policy, Regulatory and Supervisory Framework.
Others include the conclusion of the National Microfinance Development Strategy (NMDS) (a road map to guide orderly growth in the industry and enable microfinance institutions (MFIs) and MFBs to be viable to attract investments and enrich the monetary policy projections and enhance its transmission mechanism).
He said that the CBN made a commitment at the 2011 alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) Global Policy Forum held in Mexico, to reduce Nigeria's financial exclusion rate from 46.3 to 20 per cent by 2020.
Sanusi said that the Microfinance Development Fund (MDF) would be established in 2012 to improve access to affordable and sustainable source of finance by Microfinance Institutions and Microfinance Banks.
"It will have both commercial and social component. This will enhance their operations and outreach. It will also support the capacity building activities of the MFBs/MFIs," he said.
He said that they are introducing a web fair at the conference in view of the critical role of ICT in entrepreneurship development and the enormous opportunities presented by the worldwide web to tap into the global market.
"The web fair is expected to introduce more Nigerian MSMEs to doing e-business on the web. Indeed, some of the other areas of immense opportunities include product advertisement at a very low cost, customer relationship management, mobile banking and electronic payment systems, new products and price intelligence, among others," he said.
The CBN boss also annouced a special financial package meant to provide credit facility to women at single digit interest rate.
Besides, the Bankers' committee desirous of empowering women to have access to credit has set up a sub-committee on women's empowerment chaired by Chief Executive of Standard Chartered Bank while certain numbers of seats in board and managment positions in banks are to be reserved for women.
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