Six regulatory priorities to transform Nigeria’s payment industry – Ahmad

Innovation around the payment space globally is evolving and dynamic. To improve Nigeria’s payment system, six regulatory priorities have been highlighted by Aishah Ahmad, Deputy Governor, Financial System Stability, CBN and Chairman, NIBSS Plc, in the ongoing BusinessDay’s Future of Payments and Fraud Conference 2022.

According to her, the rapid digitisation of finance provides a great opportunity for growth in the financial ecosystem, as such, the role of operators can be seen as a catalyst for the change of Nigeria’s payment space.

“Innovation is acknowledged as an important lever to drive meaningful progress in this direction. While financial inclusion continues to improve in Nigeria, the Central Bank of Nigeria has set an ambitious target and that is to achieve means for enabling competition within the fintech sector, which facilitates digital financial services,” Ahmad said.

Firstly, the need for new innovative players to be identified and licensed in order to bring them within the regulatory limits was highlighted.

Also, creation of a framework to understand the markets for new players as more energy will attract opportunities and monitor changes in the monetary transmission mechanism.

Read also: SSANU, NASU present new payment platform to FG

The third one is to achieve financial inclusion and democratised access to quality, affordable and cost effective financial services for all Nigerians by resolving the challenges related to identity management, neutral financial access points into operability of payment systems, electronic payments, and open banking among others.

Ahmad noted the urgency to establish a framework for self regulation so that the fintech ecosystem is complete. This will complement the efforts of the regulator to improve cyber resilience, corporate governance and operational risk standards across the industry.

The fifth one is to ensure that the fintech sector pleases the expected growth in mitigating exposure to climate related risks, and supporting jobs transition to a greener and cleaner environment.

Lastly, Ahmad pointed out that to improve Nigeria’s payment industry, an improved access to credit through the development of necessary supporting infrastructure, such as credit scoring module, will go a long way.

“The payment system transformation will take Nigeria in meeting the aspiration of a wide spectrum of stepping into the financial ecosystem. Customers will enjoy more efficient services at more favorable prices, banks will become more efficient with lower costs and a greater resilience.

“Also, access to credit will be boosted where it is needed most, especially for individuals and small businesses, and the financial system will be more inclusive into greater depth and diversity,” Ahmad said.