Yemi Osinbajo. |
Contrary
to speculations in some quarters, the TraderMoni scheme and other GEEP
micro-credit products (MarketMoni and FarmerMoni) – a component of the Buhari
administration’s Social Investment Programme, are still very much in operation,
Mr Laolu Akande, the Senior Special Assistant on Media & Publicity to the
President (Office of the Vice President), has said.
Mr
Akande disclosed this in a progress report so on the GEEP micro-credit products
(TraderMoni, MarketMoni, and FarmerMoni).
According
to him, “So far, a target of 30,000 minimum beneficiaries per state has been
achieved in majority of the 36 states and FCT since after the national and
state polls."
Besides,
he added that "what the implementing agency has been doing since the last
phase of disbursements is generating the balance of program funding while
ramping up on the states with shortages."
“Consequently,
disbursements have continued to happen in the states; for instance, we have had
over 28,000 disbursements across 10 states since after the elections. Our
priority is ramping up these numbers in the balance of states before we move to
phase two of the program after detailed reviews and structural enhancements for
larger scale. Under the Next Level agenda, Trader Moni loans will target ten
million petty traders, a significant ramp up from the initial target of two
million beneficiaries.
On
the role of the Ministry for Industry, Trade and Investment in the
implementation of the scheme, he said, “it is actively involved in the
project.”
Mr
Akande said, “that ministry is, in
fact
the oversighting Ministry of Bank of Industry, which is the deploying agency.
The office of the Minister executes the GEEP program via the Bank of
Industry.
“The
governance structure of GEEP includes the office of the Vice President
(National Social Investment Office), The Ministry of Trade and Investment, and
the Bank of Industry.”
Speaking
on measures adopted to enhance repayments, the Presidential Media Aide said
GEEP has pioneered innovative solutions to drive repayment compliance.
“Working
with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the Nigerian Interbank Settlement
System (NIBSS), we successfully piloted the concept of the BVN as digital
collateral; and we saw repayment go up significantly on the MarketMoni and
FarmerMoni loans.
“For
TraderMoni, beneficiaries can pay back at any commercial bank in the country
just like a NEPA or WAEC bill; all they need to provide the bank teller with is
their phone number. We also developed and successfully piloted scratch cards as
a repayment option for beneficiaries who stay kilometres away from the nearest
banks in their community. The cards are loaded the same way Telco recharge
cards are loaded, thus requiring no new learning curve.
“This
improved repayment received compliance to the extent that in January, the Bank
of Industry began second level disbursements - disbursements of N15,000 - to
beneficiaries in Lagos, Borno, Ogun and Oyo states for trader who had
successfully paid back their first N10,000 loans,” Mr Akande disclosed.
According
to him, “GEEP's vision (in the long term) remains to empower the over 30
million MSMEs in Nigeria with interest-free, collateral-free loans.”
The
GEEP programme, a component of the Buhari administration’s Social Investment
Programme (SIP) has since inception about two years ago, impacted many lives,
improved living conditions and expanded opportunities for ordinary Nigerians to
do petty trading as well as small and medium scale businesses.
Under
the Trader Moni scheme, an initial N10,000 loan is given to petty traders and
once they repay within six months, they can receive a new N15,000 loan and when
they repay that they can get another N20,000 loan until they get as much as
N100,000.
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