Bankers Committee reiterates strategic importance of MSMEs
The Bankers’ Committee and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) have once again reiterated the strategic importance of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to the growth of the nation’s economy.
The two bodies stressed this at two workshops in Abuja and Owerri on the N220 billion Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises Development Fund organized by the Bankers’ Committee’s sub-committee on Economic Development, Sustainability & Gender, in collaboration with the CBN.
In his opening remarks, the Director, Development Finance Department at CBN, Dr. Mudasiru Olaitan said the essence of the workshop was to enable the deposit money banks (DMB) key into the strategic plan of the CBN for the MSMEs. “MSMEs are the engine room for economic growth, vehicle for job creation, tools for poverty alleviation and wealth creation for any country’s economy, so there is need to support them to grow so that the economy can grow,” Olaitan stressed.
The Assistant Director, MSME Development Fund, CBN, Mr. Tobin Jonathan, disclosed that the rejection rate of MSME applications by commercial banks was quite high. “We are aware that this is necessitated by the banks’ aversion to risk due to lack of entrepreneurial skills and poor governance structures of most MSMEs, hence the necessity of the workshop to enlighten the bankers and encourage them more on the need to partner with to grow the sector,” she said.
Mr. Peter Bamkole, Director, Enterprise Development Centre, Pan Atlantic University, challenged banks to embrace MSME financing through stimulation and be seen as intermediators by creating marked access. According to him, banks should assist big businesses connect the dots with the MSMEs. He listed major impediments to MSME growth in Nigeria as including absence of an enabling environment, inconsistent government policies and lack of access to finance.
The Manager, Development Finance department of the CBN, Mrs. Rukiyat Akanbi lamented that since the N220bn MSME intervention fund was launched in 2014, the uptake by the DMBs had not been encouraging. “There is then the need to interact with SME officers of banks to understand the banks’ challenges in MSME financing,” she said. The CBN, she stated, hopes that more than 50 per cent of the fund would have been accessed by the end of 2015 in compliance with the target set by the Bankers’ Committee.
Mrs. Akanbi believed the workshop would serve banks well to increase awareness about the intervention fund, build capacity within the sector, develop innovative MSME financing products and take advantage of the over 17 million