Category: Include Everyone

Informal Women Traders and Youth are some of the most unserved and underserved people in matters digital and finance. For finance particularly, this is so because most Informal Women and Youth don’t have collateral security to use to access credit plus majority of their businesses are undocumented thus lack proper financial records and data to support their need for finances.

With most formal institutions not welcoming them, many turn to seeking for support from alternative credit channels which are usually expensive.

However, innovators are contributing to addressing this challenge through developing platforms that help create financial history and also record business data for these kinds of businesses. One such platforms is Tawaza Digital Varieties; a new digital and financial inclusion start-up for Informal Women and Youth. 

“We are a digital financial services provider currently doing savings, credit and payments. We mainly work with Women and Youth in the informal sector. We deliver these services through a digital platform that was installed for us by our partners – Instersolve, Kenya. This platform came with a complete framework that allows us to onboard users and also be able to have subscribers visit it and learn more about how to work with digital products,” noted Winfred Nandawula, the regional programs director for Tawaza Digital Varieties.

She added: “Among the digital products we have is Diva Grow; this allows customers to do saving and investment. After subscription, they choose from three available options and get started. They can deposit, withdraw and buy shares. We also have a digital ledger product, which helps small businesses to smartly record their business records and use them to access finance.”

Nandawula highlighted that their target audience are people with some income source but have been left out of the formal finance systems due to absence of records about their businesses. She noted that Tawaza is accessible both as a mobile APP and through USSD.

“We started to offer digital financial services in 2022. We have onboarded over 1300 subscribers and on these, some 200 are active monthly platform users. These save and access credit of not more than UGX 500,000 every now and then,” she noted.

Tawaza has featured on Day 38 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Since time immemorial, many people have been investing in tangible assets mainly, land, houses, automotives, and animals. But with technology, investment options have expanded with Treasury Bills, Bonds, Equity and Shares among others added to a list of areas of investment.

Among the companies that are providing technology supported investment in Uganda is XENO.

“We are a licensed Fund Manager that is helping over 120,000 individuals, groups and institutions to plan, save and invest for future expenses. We are using technology to help anyone who has a future goal to start saving from as low as UGX 10,000. We have a mobile APP, available on web and available on the MTN MoMo USSD,” said Arthur Nakkaka, a Product Manager XENO Uganda.

He added: “We are at the intersection of Fund Management and Technology. As a Fund Manager, we are a run four regulated funds. Bond Fund, Money Market Fund and Two Equity Funds. On the other side, we are a technology company that is using technology to offer a service that was once only available to a niche audience. We are distributing this service at scale to anyone who is able to save.”

He noted that XENO supports its customers to come up with a saving plan, design a portfolio and execute it, with continuous tracking through a mobile APP and guidance.

“For any saver, we need to understand why they are saving. There are very many modes of investment but the one we believe is the most effective is the goal-based investment. We always ask our clients what goal they want to achieve, we then ask them, the period they want to achieve this. After aligning on this, a customer goes on the XENO APP or the MTN MoMo USSD and get started. We also need to understand your attitude towards risk as this will determine where we will invest your money. So, what you save per day or month plus the returns you get from the investment is what will enable you achieve your goal,” he said.

He highlighted that they welcome customers as individuals, partners, and groups which can be formal or informal groups. The other customers they serve are institutional customers. He revealed that the most popular goals on the XENO platform are building wealth, education, building a home, retirement and income drawdown.

In Uganda, XENO Investment Management Limited is licensed and regulated as a Fund Manager by Uganda’s Capital Markets Authority and by the Uganda Retirement Benefits Regulatory Authority.

XENO has featured on Day 37 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Interaction between AgriTech and FinTech is key to ensuring that Farmers can benefit more from Agriculture. Well as AgriTech focuses mainly on introducing technology in to agriculture, integration with FinTech (financial technology) moves this a notch higher as it doesn’t only make farmers adopt technology for farming but also ensures that they are able to transact – make and receive payments from the comfort of their farms.

It is this interaction that Hamwe East Africa is spearheading. Started as an AgriTech in 2013, Hamwe has over the years transformed into an AgriTech – FinTech; all for the benefit of farmers.

“We work with underserved farmers in off the grid areas of Uganda and East Africa. Well as everybody else tried to work with Farmers in peri-urban areas and central region, for us, we decided to go to areas were farmers lack services such as internet access. These are the actual smallholder farmers that need support,” Stella N. Lugalambi, a co-founder and managing director of Hamwe East Africa noted.

She added: “We build a farmer management system that enables farmers get a farming system, digital identity and economic identity. We are giving smallholder farmers an identity that allows them to access finance because they will have a system with credible data to prove that they actually earn and can afford to manage this finance.”

Hamwe is active in Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi with plans to expand to the rest of East Africa in the near future.

“To date, we have over 400,000 farmers in Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. We are planning to go to Kenya and Tanzania and grow our numbers to one million farmers by 2025. The beginning was a bit difficult but now we onboard more farmers easily because we know what to do. Even farmers are also adapting easily.”

Lugalambi noted that they offer a complete agriculture support service. Hamwe East Africa’s bundled services to the over 400,000 farmers include farmers’ profiling, assessing farmers’ needs, identifying off takers, connecting farmers to inputs suppliers and ready markets, agronomy services, crop insurance, payments and access to credit.

“Majority of our members come from cooperatives. Our work is coordinated by digital community entrepreneurs that support between 100 to 300 farmers. The digital community entrepreneurs (DCE) talk to farmers at the last mile because we get them from the same community where the farmers come from so they can easily engage and support them. The DCEs report to Territory Executives at the district level,” she said. 

She revealed that in order to further support farmers, they added FinTech solutions to the platform which are enabling farmers to easily transact.

“To ensure that our farmers are served well, we signed up with mobile network operators – MTN and Airtel for a payment gateway. We are directly connected with the mobile money operators so our farmers get their payments directly to their phones. We have also signed up with banks and Flexipay. These payment alternatives ensure that our farmers don’t have to be embarrassed walking long distances to banks to access their money.”

She nonetheless called upon the government, telecom operators and development partners to invest more in network upgrade and data connectivity as this will enable more farmers benefit more from these services.

On their part, she noted that Hamwe has partnered with Mastercard Inc to deliver a community pass – an electronic card that stores farmers’ information.

“We have just rolled out this card and it is so far being used by about 20,000 farmers. This is our newest innovation. It is accessible offline. We plan to upgrade it to even support payments in the future,” she concluded. 

Hamwe has featured on Day 36 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Informal cross border trade is one of the oldest forms of trade across Africa. It employs millions of people majority of them being women and youth.

Research carried out by the African Development Bank (AfDB) shows that cross-border trade is a source of income to millions of people across the African continent. Uganda alone has thousands of informal cross border traders plying their trade in border towns such as Malaba, Busia, Mutukula, Elegu, Katuna, Mirima, and Goli.

However, majority of these traders are faced with several challenges such as lack of market information, absence of interoperable payment platforms, counterfeits and fake money, and cases of mistreatment at the borders.

Nonetheless, innovators, government and development partners are working to mitigate, somewhat put an end to these issues. One way they are doing this is through developing digital platforms to support this kind of trade. Among such platforms being used by cross border traders in Uganda is iSOKO.

“In 2016, Trademark Africa conducted a research on why informal women cross border traders where losing a lot of money while conducting their business. This research revealed that the women traders were losing money due to lack of market information. That is how iSOKO came about with letter I standing for digital or internet and Soko meaning shop. So, Isoko simply means a digital/online shop,” Rogers Mwesigwa the ICT Technical Assistant for iSOKO, Uganda Chapter explained the genesis of this platform.

He added: “But on top of providing the traders with information, iSOKO also added more modules including the market module that enables traders to display and sell their products from wherever they are. As of today, iSOKO is being used in five countries – Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi. There is a plan to expand Isoko allover Africa with focus on the countries that Trademark Africa has presence in so that Africans can have an online shop that allows them to trade with in two or more states.”

Mwesigwa noted that iSOKO APP is downloadable on Google Play after which a trader can register and start trading in addition to accessing relevant trade facilitation information.

“After downloading and registering, the trader can then post their products. When a potential buyer sees the products, they place an order and the trader receives a notification. There is an in-chat APP within iSOKO that enables the trader and buyer to chat and negotiate. The APP also provides market information, daily exchange rate and information about taxes as well as a tax calculator.”

He revealed that iSOKO currently has over 80,000 users from allover the five countries with these numbers expected to grow to about 120,000 by the end of the year.

“When we started this platform, we focused on women. So, majority of the traders on the platform are women. However, we know that trade is not a one sex affair so we also onboard male traders.”

iSOKO has featured on Day 33 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

SchoolPal, an education management system, is committed to using technology to transform education and enhance school life. This is according to its founder and CEO, Shane Senyonga.

“At SchoolPal, we deliver Education management solutions from a dashboard we give to schools and an APP that parents use to access school details for their children. We also have an APP specifically for teachers. Our core solutions are communication, performance analytics and payments,” Senyonga said.

He explained that for payments, SchoolPal supports school fees payments, pocket money and payment of other school related activities as such trips, plus items like books and new uniforms among others.

“The schools only have to set the school fees on the system. When the parents open the APP, they can pay the school fees and money deducted of their mobile money and bank payment cards such as Visa or Mastercard. Those off the APP can also pay through the USSD and get their receipts. At any point, the platform shows you your child’s school fees balance and sends reminders about the same. Parents can also pay for things like sweaters, after which the school gets the notification and gives the sweater to the pupil,” Senyonga noted.

He added: “We are also digitizing pocket money. We have a card we give to boarding school pupils. Through our APP, the parents can load pocket money on the card and the pupil will receive and use it. The parents are able to monitor how much their children are spending and can continuously top up for them.”

Senyonga noted that SchoolPal services are accessible after ‘schools registering on the platform and onboarding their students and their parents’.

“We have been building since platform 2022 but we entered the market this year. Our numbers are not too high but they are promising. We have several schools that have been on trial this term and will start using the platform for managing their payments in third term, so it is very promising,” he concluded.

SchoolPal has featured on Day 32 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Farmers and generally people living in rural areas have over the years been the most unserved when it comes to access to financial services. This is particularly because they usually don’t have financial records, credit history and business data to back their requests for finances.  

However, technology is changing this as it is allowing thousands to be able to create reliable financial and business records that can be depended on when assessing credit worthiness. Among the platforms making this possible is aXiom Zorn.

“We are a data forensic enterprise. We started this out of the love to help unserved and underserved people be able to access finance and other services. Many banks used to turn away farmers and people from rural areas because they didn’t have data about them; their work, productivity and incomes. So, aXiom came to close this data gap. We use data to produce services that can help the farmers and generally rural people,” Carol Kyazze Kakooza, the Executive Director of aXiom Zorn said.

She noted that for eight years now, aXiom Zorn has been ensuring that farmers and rural people have visible and authentic data that enables them to get different services such as access to finance, insurance, micro-health, and markets.

“We support a wide range of institutional clients, including banks, insurance companies, and agricultural stakeholders. Our company’s database, which includes detailed profiles of over 600,000 households with 326 data points each, forms the backbone of their innovative solutions. Among the banks we have partnered with is one of the biggest banks that works for the people – Centenary Bank. We merged our credit score matrix with Centenary Bank and with this, hundreds of customers have been served,” she explained, adding: 

“After we have rated the customers, we submit the credit scores and Centenary Bank usually extends credit to anybody with a credit score of 50 per cent and above. Those below 50 per cent can also access financial services from other lenders. We also provide a credit limit to the bank so that people are not given money that they have never received and unable to manage.” 

She noted that through the data they collect, they are able to derive several other services including the progress out of poverty credit score, access to finance, access to markets, digital soil map, fertilizer optimization, and insurance.

aXiom Zorn has featured on Day 31 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Access to affordable credit is a big pain point for individuals and businesses alike. Majority that need loans don’t qualify to access them through formal institutions due to institutional red tape and absence of requirements such as collateral and guarantors.  These end up relaying on traditional money lenders who in their nature are exploitative.

Nonetheless, advancement in technology is allowing innovators to develop solutions to address such challenges. One of the most popular financial technology innovations is digital saving and lending platforms. Among those playing in this field is Fido Credit.

Regulated by the Uganda Microfinance Regulatory Authority (UMRA), Fido Credit offers digital personal loans of up to UGX 1.4 million and digital Business loans of up to UGX 2.5 million.

“Fido is inspired by its customers who are striving to make a difference in their daily lives. Fido is on a mission to empower individuals and entrepreneurs to take charge of their future by providing financial services that are inclusive, instant, and easily accessible through Fido’s innovative digital products. We offer both individual and business loans,” Robert Muhumuza, the deputy CEO of Fido Credit, Uganda said.

He noted that for personal loans, one has to submit his/her know your customer (KYC) details after which they are accessed and a credit score is done, showing how much they can access instantly.

“For personal loans we start from UGX 60,000 to UGX 1.4 million shillings. Once your loan has been approved as per your credit score, it is disbursed and received on your mobile money number with in 5 minutes. A customer can choose to select the 10 days or 30 days repayment period. Interest is charged on a daily basis so the earlier you pay the less interest you pay,” he noted.  

On the other hand, for a business to access a business loan, the business owner must submit the know your business (KYB) details after which a credit score is done and a loan limit assigned.

“For businesses, the proprietor uploads documents that prove ownership of a business. This may include certificate of incorporation and trading license. Business loans are disbursed instantly, so if you have all the documents you are able to get a loan with in 5 minutes. The minimum amount is UGX 400,000 and the maximum for business loans is UGX 2.5 million. The repayment period is still 10 days or 30 days,” he explained.

Robert Muhumuza noted that for the time they have been in Uganda, they have already served over 700,000 customers and disbursed money in billions.

Fido APP has featured on Day 30 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

For start-ups, micro, small and medium sized enterprises (MSMEs), proceeds from sales are in many cases immediately injected back in to the operations of the business. Many never have a luxury of having huge capital to keep them running for weeks, in to months like big players are able to.

As such, such businesses always need seamless payment collections platforms that ensure that for whatever sale made, the money is remitted immediately so that to keep the business in good health. While several payment aggregators and enablers promise this, it is a just a few that actually do this. One of the players that is enabling MSMEs effectively collect and make payments is PayTota.

Launched in 2020, Paytota is an all-in-one online payment gateway solution that allows individuals and businesses to make and accept payments from local and international buyers and sellers. To enable this, it has integrated with local and international payment facilitators such as Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) like MTN Mobile Money and Airtel Money, Banks, and Payment Cards Operators like Visa and Mastercard.

According to Erasmus Okurut, the founder and CEO of PayTota, his company is a ground-breaking financial technology company that empowers businesses by providing an inclusive platform that eases their payments in terms of acceptance and also disbursements.

“We are a total payment solution that empowers businesses not only in Uganda but in the entire continent and the global. We have developed and customized a platform that allows any business to be able to accept payments. To enroll with PayTota, you just go to our website and sign up an account. You will then be asked to submit some documents as per the know your customer/business guidelines. Once your documents are received and verified, your account will be activated, integration will be done and you will start accepting payments,” Okurut explained.

He added: “We have also developed hosted pages, commonly know as check outs. A business that wants to accept payments, reaches out to us, we design these pages for you, embed them on your website and you start accepting payments. We accept mobile money and card payments. We regard ourselves as payments aggregators and operators.”

Okurut revealed that they derive the mandate to manage payments from Bank of Uganda as PayTota is fully licensed.

“We are a regulated payment gateway by Bank of Uganda. We have a license as a payment operator for small funds and third-party systems. That license gives us permission to be able to process payments for our partners. That is why over 400 businesses in Uganda and across the World trust us to manage their payments. We have had over 5000 transactions and processed over USD 400,000.”

PayTota has featured on Day 29 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

For Uganda to achieve last mile financial inclusion, there must be special focus on the unserved and underserved. This means that there must be equitable distribution and access to financial services.

Several innovators have developed and rolled out solutions aimed at democratizing savings and borrowing. But more efforts are needed if financial inclusion is to be achieved.

Among the platforms that are enabling people at the bottom of the pyramid to be able to save and access digital credit services is PesaSave.

According to Steven Emalu, the Co-Founder and Team Lead at PesaSave, they started PesaSave to address the challenges faced by those unable to be served by formal financial systems. He noted that around 2022, together with his colleagues, they tried to access credit from a bank, only to be locked out by the much paperwork, business data and lack of collateral accepted by the bank. This inspired them to start a platform that would offer an alternative to the unbanked, unserved and underserved.

“At PesaSave, we build financial technology solutions for the underserved and unbanked populations with a large focus on the Youth. We do this through the PesaSave Application that allows individuals mainly the Youth to create specific targets towards their financial needs and they periodically save towards achieving these goals. The Application is easy to access and use thus its users don’t need to travel to deposit their savings and the platform is transparent thus allowing them to track their savings,” Steven Emalu said.

He added: “We also work with groups of individuals mainly in informal sectors. These join as a group and start saving. Through these savings, they are able to meet their goals and also access credit. We are trying to create an alternative to credit as these unbanked and underserved groups are not able to access credit from formal financial institutions.”

Emalu highlighted that individual saving is open to any adult interested in saving money towards meeting a specific financial goal while group savings are for individuals that come together and agree to save as a group, agree on the saving period and the purpose of the savings.

“Both individuals and groups are able to access affordable credit against their savings. We ensure that when a group saves, individual members are able to access part of these savings as credit at an interest and terms determined by each group. Well as the credit has no collateral, those borrowing must have guarantors. So far, we are serving about 28 groups and over 600 individuals.”

He noted that to execute this work, PesaSave has partnered with licensed operators such as PayTota to support their payments and collections. He revealed that before the end of the year, they will also have a commercial bank partner and thus serve their customers better.

PesaSave has featured on Day 28 of the annual 40 Days 40 FinTechs initiative Season 5.

Run under HiPipo’s Include Everyone program that also encompasses other initiatives such as FinTech Landscape Exhibition, Women in FinTech Hackathon, Summit & Incubator, and the Digital and Financial Inclusion Summit and Digital Impact Awards Africa; the #40Days40FinTechs platform aptly provides a setting for the various players and stakeholders involved in digital and financial technology to exhibit their products and services. It also gives players a platform to share their ideas on how the unserved and underserved by the present financial systems can be brought into the fold.

With over 150 participants in the last four years, #40Days40FinTechs continues to be the world’s premier showcase event for innovations that are enabling underserved populations to join the digital economy space. We know that this can only get better owing to the inspiration and collaboration of our partners; Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Ideation Corner, and Crosslake Technologies. Most importantly, the initiative owes its continued success to the generous support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.