IFC Partners eTranzact on MobileMoney Project in Nigeria
As part of efforts to bridge the gap between the banked and the unbanked population of Nigeria, eTranzact in conjunction with International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, have embarked on a pilot project for the rural areas in Nigeria called Rural Telephony Project (RTP) MobileMoney.
RTP MobileMoney powered by eTransact is an initiative designed to bank the unbanked populace in Nigeria and Africa.
This program is built on the high mobile phone penetration and low banking coverage in Africa.
Traditional banks tend to locate their branches away from poor communities, which limit their ability to access banking services.
The mobile banking program for the unbanked seeks to improve access to banking services through the use of mobile phones.
eTranzact is Nigeria’s first award winning multi-application and multi-channel electronic transaction switching and payment processing platform.
The company has operations in Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Cote d’Ivoire, South Africa and UK and aims to provide Nigerians, Africans
and ultimately the world with cutting edge payment solutions.
IFC provides investment and advisory services to help businesses in the developing world meet the challenges of the global marketplace.
IFC is presently working with three mobile payment companies, Wizzit for South Africa, Ferlo for Dakar and eTranzact for Nigeria to run the MobileMoney programme in Africa.
RTP MobileMoney is being run with 3 Micro finance institutions, DEC, SEAP & Oghene with 50 Village Phone operators (VPOs) located in remote communities
First Bank of Nigeria is providing the banking backbone, as stipulated by the Central Bank of Nigeria guidelines, while three microfinance Institutions partners – Development Exchange Centre (Bauchi in the North), Socio Economic Advancement Program (Kwara in the West) and OGENE (Enugu in the South) are serving as touch points for the unbanked.
MTN Nigeria is also on board to provide communication gateway for the transactions. Each MFI would have distinguishing mobile account number schemes. This will identify every mobile account holder created based on their MFI’s.
The eTranzact MobileMoney Platform is a multi network capable and interface seamlessly with the third party payment schemes and the product has been specifically designed to improve access to finance to rural customers or those with little or no access to banks.
