APA-Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) – Only five central banks and a handful of instant payment system (IPS) operators have responded positively to AfricaNenda’s request to produce an annual report on the state of inclusive instant payment systems (IIPS) in Africa.
By our special correspondent Abdourahmane Diallo
AfricaNenda, a team of African experts dedicated to scaling Inclusive Instant Payment Systems (IIPS) on the continent, launched the second edition of its annual report on the state of the art of IIPS in Africa on Thursday, November 8 in Addis Ababa. Entitled the “SIIPS Report,” it was produced jointly with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the World Bank.
For this year, the study notes continued growth in the supply of instant payment systems and demand for their functionality. Significant progress has been made towards making comprehensive and inclusive instant payment systems an integral part of Africa’s Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI).
From January to June 2023, the period during which the study was conducted, no less than 32 billion transactions valued at $1.2 trillion have already been processed by active IPSs in the 22 countries covered by the study.
For this second edition, data quality has been significantly improved thanks to the contributions of several central banks and SPI operators.
However, the lack of data made the task difficult for the researchers. AfricaNenda had to rely on a range of publicly available data and information, rather than obtaining it directly from institutions.
“We made sure to send a letter to all African central banks, but only five responded positively to our request. These were the Bank of Ghana, the Central Bank of Kenya, the Central Bank of Madagascar, the Bank of Mozambique, and the National Bank of Rwanda. We continue to advocate for greater data sharing, more collaboration to meet Africa’s SPI needs and improved cross-border payments for the benefit of all Africans,” said Sabine Mensah, Deputy CEO of AfricaNenda.
On the other hand, SPI operators from Ghana, Malawi, Rwanda, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and GIMACPAY in the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) were able to submit data to fill the gaps in the first SIIPS Report.
“He who has the data, has the information. And he who has the information, has the power. We therefore invite all players in the ecosystem to work more closely together to produce the most comprehensive report possible. This will enable us to provide decision-makers with an effective tool for planning development policies in the sector,” Ms. Mensah noted.
The 2023 edition of the SIIPS report includes a detailed map of operational SPIs on the continent, key information such as SPI types, use cases and channels. It focuses on four new case studies: eKash in Rwanda, Natswitch in Malawi, the National Financial Switch in Zambia, and GIMAC, the regional switch connecting all CEMAC countries.
The report also draws on in-depth surveys and interviews with digital payments experts, end-users and micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in urban and peri-urban areas of Cameroon, Malawi, Morocco, Rwanda and Senegal. These data provide a global picture of SPI inclusion on the continent.
The report shows that only nine countries on the continent have access to inclusive instant payment systems (IIPS) at an advanced stage. These are the three national systems in Ghana, Malawi and Zambia, and one regional system, GIMACPAY, within the Central African Economic and Monetary Community.
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