Bank of Sierra Leone hosts workshop on mobile financial services

The Bank of Sierra Leone, the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Capital Development Fund International Growth Centre (IGC) recently wrapped up a three-day workshop in West Africa on mobile financial services.

The goal of the workshop was to find ways to integrate mobile banking into the lives of poor people throughout West Africa. The region is behind its African peers in mobile financial services, according to data from the IGC; only 20 percent of the population in Sierra Leone have bank accounts, and of those, 70 percent are in provincial areas.

Foday L. Mansaray, minister of state in the ministry of Finance and Economic Development, discussed the rural population's challenges. 

“In the rural areas, people have to travel long distances from their homes to collect remittances, and this represents a significant cost in addition to the required fees,” Mansaray said. “For the village farthest from Kabala (the district capital), the nearest bank is located 110 miles away. This means that people like teachers, who have to travel long distances to collect their salaries, end up losing almost half of their income just to access the only bank in the district.”

The workshop encouraged peer-to-peer learning and included delegates from the Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda.