MasterCard Charity and Finance Group to Aid African Banks
May 8, 2012 | Read Time: 1 minute
The MasterCard Foundation and the World Bank-affiliated International Finance Corporation announced on Monday a $37.4-million program to expand poor Africans’ access to financial services, reports the Associated Press.
The five-year project will steer support to banks and financial institutions that offer microloans and buttress efforts to broaden mobile banking, by which people in rural areas and urban slums underserved by traditional branches can use cellphones to send and receive money.
The project is the largest linking the corporation, a World Bank partner focused on private-sector development in poorer countries, and a private foundation. MasterCard Foundation President Reeta Roy said the partners aim to broaden Africans’ access to banking at a time when the continent is seeing greater political stability and a growing middle class.
The initiative is “part of a much, much larger story. It’s the story of the political, economic and social transformation that’s happening across this continent,” Ms. Roy said.
