M-Pesa helps to advance Africa’s economy

Africa’s household consumption is estimated at $2.1-trillion by

2025, which raises the question: how will this currency be used and consumed by Africans, and what changing needs can we identify and start to build innovations for? With many Africans still without a bank account, Africa must rethink how to financially empower its populace, while taking advantage of the growing mobile access penetration.

M-Pesa has created a space for itself in markets by ensuring that future users have access to its platform, by ensuring that Africans have mobile phones. This model is also followed by commercial giants such as Facebook; by creating new subscribers, impoverished markets demand and gain access to internet connectivity.

Vodacom has been at the helm of this mobile money innovation though M-Pesa, which caters to the unique needs of its customers and innovates as they become more sophisticated and tech-savvy. M-Pesa is a mobile money platform, allowing its clients to store and transfer funds through their mobile phones. The ability to process $1.9-billion monthly on its platform has taken different forms in each of the countries it operates. It is able to offer loan and savings options to its customers, and even allows for the purchase of tickets to events unique to the countries it operates in.

M-Pesa empowers the people it interacts with daily, and assists Africa in fighting pandemics such as HIV. It has assisted with treating over 3 200 mothers with obstetric fistulas in Tanzania, by transferring bus fare to mothers needing to visit healthcare facilities.

Over 400 M-Pesa ambassadors took part in this campaign, which was also facilitated by the organisation Comprehensive Community Based Rehabilitation. Tanzania’s Moyo Project makes use of M-Pesa ambassadors. In Lesotho M-Pesa is playing its part in combatting the spread of HIV in Africa.

Gaining access to financial instruments is a rapid and efficient way to empower a society, allowing the populace to become financially literate, which stimulates economic growth. Nobel Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank, changed a country through his micro-loan facilities in Bangladesh, showing how powerful micro-loans can be. M-Pesa enabling financial inclusion to communities, which otherwise would not have access to financial services, is playing a crucial role as an enabler in addressing the United Nation’s sustainable development goals.

M-Pesa’s contribution to financial infrastructure cannot be ignored; 37% of Tanzania’s GDP goes through this platform. This platform demonstrates the power of understanding the needs of Africans at a community level.