50 pct of adult Tanzanians still unbanked, says NMB official.

The National Microfinance bank (NMB) has launched a new campaign aimed at incorporating unbanked Tanzanians into formal financial services so as to improve economy and their livelihoods.
 
This was said on Wednesday in Dar es Salam by the bank’s Head of Alternative Channels, George Kivaria, when explaining on the campaign.
 
He told The Guardian that the campaign would enable more Tanzanians particularly those who do not have bank accounts to open one within their areas.
 
“Our bank officials would be moving around in various remote areas to help these people open their accounts, hence enable them to join formal financial services,” he said.
 
Kivaria said NMB has been firmly committed to its mission of building financial inclusion for all Tanzanians, in rural areas and urban areas.
 
According to him, over 50 percent of the Tanzanian adult population is unbanked; hence more efforts are needed to see that they are joined in financial services.
 
Explaining, he said the bank has been conducting various campaigns aimed at increasing the number of account holders.
 
Citing, he said, two years ago the bank launched a new service dubbed NBM Chap Chap account which has proved to be a success.
 
“We have witnessed over 250,000 Tanzanians who did not have bank accounts joined in the service, this is a clear example that there is a big gap in financial inclusion among locals,” he added.
 
He said the new account will simplify the process of opening a bank account whereby a customer can instantly open an account, get an ATM card, and immediately start using that bank account to meet their financial needs within minutes and at their own vicinity without visiting any NMB branch.
 
The Chap Chap Account is designed innovatively to overcome the major barriers to financial inclusion that is lack of financial knowledge, proximity to a branch network and relatively high costs of operating a normal account.
 
However the government in collaboration with the private sector has been in the forefront in increasing the number of adults who access financial services from 27 percent to 50 next year.
 
Recently, the government through the National Council for Financial Inclusion announced plans to increase the percentage of adults who access financial services to 50 percent in the year 2016.
 
The council chairman, Prof Benno Ndullu, was quoted as saying the 50 percent target is in line with the international commitment that the Bank of Tanzania, on behalf of financial sector stakeholders, made in Riviera Maya, Mexico in 2011 under the Alliance for Financial Inclusion Global Initiative known as 'the Maya Declaration.'
 
The framework has been developed through a comprehensive stakeholders’ consultative process. It involved in-depth reviews of financial inclusion related studies in Tanzania and other developing countries.
 
It also involved synthesis of national policies that are in line with the identification of fundamental barriers for financial inclusion and strategic solutions to enable widespread availability and usage of basic financial services.
 
Such services include savings, credit, payments, insurance and more advanced financial services such as pensions, securities and government transfers through formal mechanisms.
 
He said the council will implement a three year financial inclusion framework from this year to 2016 that would be guided by the shared vision and commitment from all the relevant stakeholders in developing coordinated initiatives between public and private sectors.
 
'This is an important basis for achieving other important dimensions of financial inclusion such as regular usage of quality services and improved welfare of users,” he said.
 
He further said that this is a rolling plan that will be reviewed and updated to reflect the vision beyond 2016.
 
The framework aims at addressing the fundamental broad barriers that limit financial inclusion by establishing a broad and robust infrastructure to support growth of appropriate financial services and use of technologically driven delivery channels.
 
Experts say the level of financial inclusion in Tanzania is still low despite various initiatives that have been taken so far.
 
However, leveraging on mobile telephone technology with 30 million subscribers has significantly enabled nearly 43 percent of the adult population (9.8 million) to have active mobile payment accounts.

 
SOURCE: IPPMEDIA

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