Facebook Monday announced a ₦500m grant to support 781 small businesses in Nigeria.
The grant is part of Facebook’s $100m Global Grants Programme announced earlier this year, which aims to support 30,000 small businesses in over 30 countries, a statement from social media giant said on Monday.
Aimed at stimulating economic recovery following the effects of COVID-19, Facebook said the grant would help empower and extend a lifeline to local small business owners who have been most affected.
The grants will be administered and managed by Deloitte in partnership with FATE Foundation and Afrigrant, the statement added.
“It will be provided as a combination of cash and ad credits to help small businesses as they rebuild, re-engineer and recover operations during this challenging year”, it said.
Available to qualifying SMBs in Nigeria, applications will be open from Monday, 24th August 2020 for the North East, North West and South East regions and 26th August 2020 for the South West, South-South and North Central regions.
It said small business owners can check www.facebook.com/grantsforbusiness to see whether they’re eligible as well as apply and find out more details about the programme.
In the recent State of Small Business Report, published by Facebook in partnership with the OECD and the World Bank, the many challenges faced by SMBs during this COVID-19 crisis were laid bare, specifically with over 37% of SMBs in Nigeria saying that cash is a concern.
“We know small businesses are the engine of the Nigerian economy, the COVID-19 pandemic has extended beyond a public health crisis to an economic emergency, with these small businesses most affected.
“We’re listening to the challenges these small business owners are facing right now and want to provide useful resources for them during this difficult and uncertain year” said Nunu Ntshingila, Regional Director, Facebook Africa.
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