The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is about to launch a key policy document that would facilitate the attainment of the financial inclusion target by next year.
The CBN said on Monday that it would lead other National Financial inclusion stakeholders in Nigeria for a major event in Abuja on Thursday and Friday for the launch of document. The new strategy would be coming after fears had been raised that the country may miss the target.
Latest figures released by Enhancing Financial Innovation and Access (EFInA) indicate that 36.6 million Nigerian adults, representing about 36.8 percent of the Nigerian adult population, do not have access to formal financial Services yet.
In a mailed statement, the CBN said the Policy documents to be unveiled at the conference are expected to attract over 400 delegates and include the Revised National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS2.0), the Financial Literacy Framework, the Consumer Protection Framework and the Consumer Education framework.
According to details obtained from the apex bank, the conference also aims to ensure that new comers into the financial inclusion bracket are adequately protected and educated in line with the provisions of the policy documents.
Other objectives of the two-day conference to be declared open by the CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele are to update participants on the growing sophistication of the financial market, the competitive environment in which financial services providers operate, and the benefit and value of providing access to financial services among others.
While hoping to enhance consumer confidence and trust in the financial services to facilitate progress towards achieving 80% financial inclusion target by 2020, the CBN and other stakeholders also seek to obtain customer feedback on how best to implement the financial inclusion policies.
To achieve its financial inclusion target, Nigeria, through the National Financial Inclusion stakeholders, seeks to cut the exclusion rate down to 20% by the year 2020, hence various public and private organizations under the auspices of National Financial inclusion
stakeholders have been working assiduously since the launch of the first National Financial Inclusion Strategy in 2012 to achieve the objective of 80% inclusion by 2020.
Onyinye Nwachukwu, Abuja
