EBI annual conference focuses on financial inclusion

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Mon, 08 May 2017 - 07:54 GMT

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Mon, 08 May 2017 - 07:54 GMT

Central Bank of Egypt Photo Archive

Central Bank of Egypt Photo Archive

CAIRO – 8 May 2017: The 9th annual conference of the Egyptian Banking Institute (EBI) focused on financial inclusion and discussed ways to enhance it, given its importance for economic development.

“The only way to create a stable economy is through ensuring that all citizens and segments of society are included in the official banking sector and enjoy its financial services,” Gamal Negm, Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) said during his speech in the conference on Monday.

Financial inclusion means that each individual or institution can have financial products suitable for their needs, and it is one of the primary goals of the CBE. Financial products include savings and current accounts, financing, credit, among other financial services.

The Central Bank said last week that financial inclusion aims to allow all segments of society to have opportunities of properly managing their finances and to safely guarantee that citizens will not be forced to resort to unofficial means that are not subject to any form of supervision which may expose them to fraud or excess fees.

The CBE launched “the Arab week for financial inclusion” initiative from 27 April-4 May, with the aim of bringing the biggest numbers of individuals and companies under the umbrella of the banking sector.

Negm also spoke about the CBE’s initiatives to finance medium- and small-sized enterprises (SMEs), providing funds up to 10 billion EGP to projects in the agriculture and renewable energy sectors.

He added that the Central Bank has already managed to finance 37,000 SMEs, with 101 billion EGP, and it will launch a comprehensive initiative to fund and provide credit facilities to the micro-sized enterprises by the end of May.


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