GEEP, TRADERMONI get global recognition

This seems to be a season of international commendations for the microcredit scheme of the Federal Government.

In recognition of its impact driving financial inclusion in Nigeria, the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP) and its products have earned recent recognition from the United Nations, African Leadership Institute andOxford University.

GEEP, a microcredit initiative of the Federal Governmentstarted in 2016, includes MarketMoni, FarmerMoni, and the TraderMoni scheme which generated some controversy during the elections. However, with about 2 million Nigerians at the bottom of the pyramid accessing credit in 3 years and being brought into financial services of bank account and mobile wallets, there is consensus on the scale of impact the initiative wields. GEEP is today the largest public microcredit scheme in the world. 54.2% of its beneficiaries are women.

In a March session of 62ndUnited Nations Commission in New York, GEEP was commended for pushing the envelope in technological innovations for successful last-mile delivery of credit at massive scale. This was in recognition of the programme’s pioneering roles in building a completely digitised loan operation, positioning of Bank Verification (BVN) as digital collateral to aid financial inclusion, use of facial recognition for de-deduplication, GPS-based mapping and profile of candidates to markets, and exhaustive data capture to truly formalise the informal sector.

The radical approach to GEEP’s operation was perhaps a major influence for the recent recognition bestowed on the programme’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), Uzoma Nwagba, by a partnership between the African Leadership Initiative and University of Oxford.

Last week, the COO, together with 22 other emerging African leaders picked across the continent, was announced as a recipient of 2019 Archbishop Desmond Tutu Leadership Fellowship. The Desmond Tutu Fellowship is set up by AFLI and Oxford to identify and cultivate young African leaders whose works have achieved “far reaching impact on the continent.”

GEEP, a financial inclusion scheme driven by technology has registered over 7million micro-enterprises in less than 3 years – and is on a mission to deliver access to finance and financial inclusion at Nigeria’s base of the pyramid.