Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria

According to EFInA, evidence worldwide has demonstrated that access to financial services contributes both to economic growth and wealth creation and is, ...

“The growth in agent networks which has been significant also in the North-east (67 per cent in 2020) will be important for improving financial inclusion in the north. Aishah Ahmad said the bank is assiduously working towards achieving its 95 per cent financial inclusion target by 2024, going by the Revised National Financial Inclusion Strategy (NFIS 3.0) and some other important policy frameworks. This change did not happen by accident but resulted from the decisive and concerted approach by National Financial Inclusion stakeholders to address key pain points and bottlenecks that were deterring financial inclusion,” he said. Godwin Emefiele, and other stakeholders for their contributions towards promoting and deepening financial inclusion in the country. More worrisome was the fact that many adults were financially excluded. According to him, the Accord is a global initiative for responsible and sustainable financial inclusion that aims to reduce poverty and ensure financial stability for the benefit of all. He said as part of its commitment to that Accord, Nigeria developed its first financial inclusion strategy in 2012, where it set a goal of achieving a financial inclusion rate of 80 per cent by 2020. Emefiele maintained that financial inclusion remained key to economic development and inclusive growth, stressing that there is a positive correlation between the financial inclusion rate of a country and its GDP growth. As a result, the CBN governor said stakeholders undertook the onerous task of driving access to finance for the benefit of the hitherto excluded segments through the National Financial Inclusion Strategy. According to Emefiele, the Financial Inclusion Steering Committee is the apex body responsible for implementing the Nigerian Financial Inclusion Strategy and ensuring the alignment of financial inclusion policy objectives to the inclusive development objective of the federal government. The CBN governor chairs the National Financial Inclusion Steering Committee, which had worked tremendously to achieve a 65 per cent financial inclusion rate over the past few years, and further targets 95 per cent inclusion by 2024. The results of the EFInA Access to Financial Services in Nigeria 2012, revealed that 34.9 million adults, representing 39.7 per cent of the adult population were financially excluded, and only 28.6 million adults were banked, representing 32.5 per cent of the adult population.