The Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation has called on financial institutions in the country to fund Micro, Small and Medium Scale Enterprises through moveable collaterals.
This, It said becames necessary to engender and stimulate domestic growth.
The Director, Special Insured Institutions Department, Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation, Mr. Joshua Etopidiok, stated this at the 2019 sensitisation workshop on “Dead Capital/moveable Collaterals and MSMEs funding for Microfinance Banks (MFBs) Operators in the South East and South South Zones organised by NDIC, which held at Edinan Hotels and Suites Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.
He said moveable collaterals are created to expand the credit space for individuals and MSMEs adding that about 36.8 percent of adult population in Nigeria are financially excluded and lacked access to savings and loans.
He said “There is urgent need to encourage banks, especially Microfinance Banks, to fund Micro Small and Medium Scale Enterprises through the shoulders of moveable collaterals. About 36.8 percent of the adult population in Nigeria are financially excluded and lacked access to savings and loans and moveable collaterals are created to expand the credit space for individuals and MSMEs”.
He said with rising unemployment, reduction in foreign reserves, and slack in economic activities, there was need to stimulate and activate domestic economy through MSMEs which are engines of growth in any country.
According to him a time has come for Nigeria to shift from youth empowerment to youth investment and look inward to creating investment and growth using moveable collaterals.
The workshop, he said, would expose the Micro Finance Bank operators in the Zones to the philosophy and practice of funding MSMEs using moveable collaterals adding that that financial institutions that will be profitable and sustainable are those ready and willing to fund MSMEs.
Speaking while declaring the workshop open, the Akwa Ibom state commissioner for Lands and Town Planning, Arc. Ime Ekpo, commended the NDIC for bringing the workshop to Uyo, the state capital and called on participants and MFBs Operators in the Zones to take the workshop seriously as it will engender social and economic development of the state.
He said the objectives of the workshop were in line with the state government’s initiatives which is to create investment opportunities for the youths in order to stem rising unemployment and poverty in the state.
