Access Bank plans to invest $1billion to boost 10 million Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Africa over the next five years.
The Executive Director, African subsidiaries, Seyi Kumapayi, said this on the sidelines of a two-day SMEs Immersion Round table in Lagos, themed: “Enhancing the Capabilities of SMEs Across Africa.”
Kumapayi, noting that Africa has about 1.4 billion people, or 17% of the world’s population, said: “However, from a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) standpoint, we only have 2.5% of GDP.
He said Africa is not producing enough, adding that the SMEs space in the continent is underdeveloped, and are faced with three major problems that are interwoven – access to finance, affordability and the capacity to manage businesses themselves.
“And that is what we are trying to fix over the next five years. We would make an impact in about 10 million SMEs across Africa. There are 90 million SMEs across Africa,” Kamapayi said.
He said Access Bank is ready to support youths and women entrepreneurs across Africa, and has assembled an array of Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) that will help build the capacities of SMEs.
Also speaking, Mrs Ayodele Olojede, Group Head, Emerging Business Africa, Access Bank Group, said that the bank loves SMEs and would do everything within its power to support them.
And that is what we are trying to fix over the next five years. We would make an impact in about 10 million SMEs across Africa. There are 90 million SMEs across Africa.
Olojede said the bank had branches in 14 African countries, adding that its support to SMEs would transform the continent.
According to her, Africa’s contribution to the gross domestic product (GDP) is very low because the SMEs are struggling, adding that the game changer will be to build their capacity for scalability beyond access to finance.
“We don’t just give SMEs access to finance, but we help them in other areas that will help them to open up their businesses to market opportunities and then go into services that they will be able to access.
“We have found that a lot of SMEs spend 70% of their time in activities that do not add up to their bottom line.
“That in itself tells you that they won’t be able to scale up as long as they continue to focus on those activities.
“So one of the ways we can help them is to create a platform where they can access all of those services easily, and so we can crash the 70% of their time to 30%.
“And so we can help them to spend 70% on those activities that can help them to scale, that for me is the game changer,” Olojede said. (NAN)
