Press spotlights CBN’s partnership with Bill Gates on financial inclusion, others

APA – Lagos (Nigeria)
The report that the Central Bank of Nigeria and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have finalised the plan to drive financial inclusion in Nigeria is one of the trending stories in Nigerian newspapers on Monday.
The Central Bank of Nigeria and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have finalised the plan to drive financial inclusion in the country.
According to a statement from the apex bank on Sunday, the two groups recently held a strategic meeting on how to deepen collaboration on financial inclusion in Nigeria.
During the meeting, the CBN’s Acting Governor, Mr Folashodun Shonubi, reiterated the commitment of the apex bank to continually partner with BMGF and other development partners to explore innovative solutions for driving access to finance.
The acting CBN governor also noted that the move for financial inclusion in Nigeria faced a number of challenges.
The statement read in part, “Mr Shonubi, who was accompanied by the Deputy Governor, Financial System Stability, Mrs Aishah Ahmad, disclosed that though much progress had been made in various aspects of financial inclusion, some challenges still remained in attaining the desired level of financial inclusion in Nigeria. He, therefore, called for greater partnership between the Bank and the BMGF.”
In his remarks, the Co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Mr Bill Gates, stated that the foundation’s focus areas for continued engagement in Nigeria included health, agriculture and financial services.
The statement added, “Mr Gates expressed satisfaction that support from his organisation was catalysing developmental action in Nigeria. While nothing that there were still challenges and gaps, he expressed optimism that the country would witness better outcomes given the new economic and monetary policies currently in place in Nigeria.
“The BMGF has supported financial inclusion in Nigeria since 2012 and has been a strategic partner of the CBN in driving innovation to reach excluded segments of Nigeria’s population with financial products and services.
“The partnership has brought about strategic initiatives such as the Nigeria financial services maps, a gateway for geospatial mapping of access points, the development of the National Financial Inclusion Strategy in 2012 and a revision in 2018, research into financial exclusion, scoping of digital financial services in Nigeria, and many more activities that help accelerate access to financial services.”
The newspaper says that the Federal Government has increased the deployment of mini-grids to boost power supply in rural communities and help cushion the effect of the recent removal of subsidy on Premium Motor Spirit, popularly called petrol.
It disclosed this in a statement issued in Abuja on Sunday by the Rural Electrification Agency, adding that the mini-grids would provide 24/7 electricity in the communities where they were deployed.
The Managing Director, REA, Ahmed Salihijo, who just inspected the 200KWp Solar Hybrid Mini-Grid in Danchitagi Community, Lavun Local Government Area, Niger State, said the facility, just like others, would cut down the volume PMS purchased by beneficiaries of the community.
He explained that through the Nigeria Electrification Project-Performance Based Grant initiative, over 80 similar mini-grids had been deployed across the country, ensuring equitable access to electricity.
Salihijo said the 200KWp mini-grid in Danchitagi Community was built to supply uninterrupted electricity to the area, which hosts about 2,670 people who were predominantly farmers.
He explained that of the 534 consumers of electricity from the facility, 13 of them use it for services such as tailoring, welding, refrigeration and milling of rice, as well as other farm produce.
“From the feedback we are getting, most people actually rely on petrol generators and with this mini-grid, it means that they are going to buy less of that petrol.
“That means with the subsidy removal, this could serve as a palliative that will help them cushion the effects of the removal of subsidy,” the REA boss stated.
The Guardian reports that foreign domination of Nigeria’s waters due to non-implementation of the Cabotage Act costs the country an estimated $50 billion in capital flight yearly.
The submission was made, yesterday, during the 2023 International Day of Seafarers, marked by the joint body of Nigerian Seafarer’s Professional Group, in Lagos.
The body comprises: Female Seafarers Association of Nigeria; Concerned Seafarers Forum; Merchant Seafarers Association of Nigeria; Maritime Professional Forum; Nigerian Association of Master Mariners; Great Mariners; Nigerian Seafarers Connect; Alumni of Maritime Academy of Nigeria and Nigeria Maritime Pilot Association.
The Day of Seafarer is a yearly event coordinated by International Maritime Organisation every June 25 to acknowledge the role seafarers play in international trade and global economy.
Secretary General of Merchant Seafarers Association of Nigeria, Captain Alfred Oniye, lamented that foreigners have taken over shipping trade in the country and jobs meant for local seafarers due to non-implementation of the Coastal Inland Shipping Act 2003, also known as Cabotage Act.
The Act seeks to reserve commercial transportation of goods and services within Nigeria’s coastal and inland waters to vessels flying the Nigerian flag and owned by the country’s citizens.
Oniye said 80 per cent of Nigerian seafarers are currently jobless, as most of them have been out of sea. He said implementation of the Cabotage Act will generate about $50 billion for the maritime industry yearly, but this is lost in capital flight through foreign vessels.
Oniye also stressed the need to utilise the Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund (CVFF), which is provided for in the Cabotage Act, for shipbuilding in the country. According to him, this will generate about $100 billion yearly for the country.
The newspaper says that uncertainty, inflation and other macroeconomic challenges have continued to weaken foreign investors’ appetite for stocks as the latest report by the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) showed that the total value of transactions executed by domestic investors dominates the market by 76 per cent.
Specifically, the Domestic and Foreign Portfolio Investment report released by the NGX for May showed that total domestic transactions hit N285.8 billion in May 2023 while total foreign transactions stood at N37.16 billion.
Also, total domestic transactions accounted for about 84 per cent of the total transactions carried out 16 per cent of the total transactions in the same period. The transaction data showed that total domestic transactions stood at N945 billion, whilst total foreign transactions constituted N99.3 billion.
Recall that the equities market hit the biggest single gain in two years, rising by 5.23 per cent on May 29 as investors reacted positively to President Bola Tinubu’s ‘no more fuel subsidy and immediate unification of exchange rates’ pronouncements.
Tinubu also stated that his administration would target a higher gross domestic product (GDP) growth, create jobs, work towards a unified exchange rate and ensure that investors and foreign businesses repatriate their hard-earned dividends and profits home.
This resulted in a huge bounce as the total value of transactions executed by domestic investors outperformed transactions executed by foreign Investors by 76 per cent. The performance of the market over the last 16 years showed that domestic transactions decreased by 45.30 percent from N3.556 trillion in 2007 to N1.945 trillion in 2022 whilst foreign transactions also decreased by 38.47 per cent from N616 billion to N379 billion over the same period.
Further breakdown of the report indicated that domestic transactions decreased by 45.30 per cent from N3.556 trillion in 2007 to N1.945 trillion in 2022, while foreign transactions also decreased by 38.5 from N616 billion to N379 billion over the same period.
GIK/APA