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Tag: GEEP

  • GEEP, TraderMoni earn global commendation

    The Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP), the microcredit scheme of the federal government has earned international wide acclaimed for driving financial inclusion in the country.

    GEEP, a microcredit initiative of the federal government which commenced in 2016, includes MarketMoni, FarmerMoni, and the TraderMoni has impacted over two million Nigerians at the bottom of the pyramid accessing credit in three years and being brought into financial services of bank account and mobile wallets, there is consensus on the scale of impact the initiative wields. GEEP is today the largest public microcredit scheme in the world. 54.2% of its beneficiaries are women.

    At last session of 62nd United Nations Commission in New York, GEEP was commended for pushing the envelope in technological innovations for successful last-mile delivery of credit at massive scale. This was in recognition of the programme’spioneering roles in building a completely digitised loan operation, positioning of Bank Verification (BVN) as digital collateral to aid financial inclusion, use of facial recognition for de-deduplication, GPS-based mapping and profile of candidates to markets, andexhaustive data capture to truly formalise the informal sector.

    In a related development, the programme’s Chief Operating Officer, Uzoma Nwagba emerged among 22 other emerging African leaders picked across the continent, as a recipient of 2019 Archbishop Desmond Tutu Leadership Fellowship. The Desmond Tutu Fellowship is set up by AFLI and Oxford to identify and cultivate young African leaders whose work has achieved “far reaching impact on the continent.”

    Selection into the lifelong Fellowship is an attestation of Uzoma’s role in delivering one of the world’s most impactful tech-based SME intervention programs, and the world’s largest public microcredit scheme. From the AFLI release, Nwagba is Harvard MBA who, prior to GEEP, worked as an Analyst at Goldman Sachs, Product Manager at Microsoft, and Senior Associate at African Capital Alliance. He is passionate about running public institutions like ethical businesses.

    On the home scene, beneficiaries affirm the efforts and contributions of GEEP to economic empowerment and growth with the effective deployment of MarketMoni, FarmerMoni and TraderMoni credit initiatives.

    According to Mrs Sherifat Salau, a N50, 000 MarketMoni beneficiary fromKwara who received her loan in 2016, “Before receiving GEEP MarketMoni, if I request for a N100, 000 loan, I will have to deposit N7, 500 before the loan is released. Aside from the high deposit, the interest on the N100, 000 would be almost N22, 000. By the time I am done paying back the loan, my goods would have reduced drastically and it stops me from growing the business. The loan has been of help in growing my business. With this loan, I have peace.”

    GEEP, a financial inclusion scheme driven by technology has registered over 7million micro-enterprises in less than three years – and is on a mission to deliver access to finance and financial inclusion at Nigeria’s base of the pyramid.

     

  • TraderMoni loans not for election purpose, Presidency insists

    The Presidency on Thursday said that the TraderMoni scheme and other GEEP micro-credit products (MarketMoni and FarmerMoni), which are components of the Buhari administration’s Social Investment Programme, are still very much in operation.

    A statement by Mr Laolu Akande, the Senior Special Assistant on Media & Publicity to the President (Office of the Vice President), said that the loans are not for the purpose of election.

    According to a progress report on the GEEP micro-credit products (TraderMoni, MarketMoni, and FarmerMoni), he disclosed that over 30,000 beneficiaries per state have been captured under the programme.

    He said “So far, a target of 30,000 minimum beneficiaries per state has been achieved in majority of the 36 states and FCT since after the national and state polls.”

    “What the implementing agency has been doing since the last phase of disbursements is generating the balance of program funding while ramping up on the states with shortages.”

    “Consequently, disbursements have continued to happen in the states; for instance, we have had over 28,000 disbursements across 10 states since after the elections. Our priority is ramping up these numbers in the balance of states before we move to phase two of the program after detailed reviews and structural enhancements for larger scale. Under the Next Level agenda, Trader Moni loans will target ten million petty traders, a significant ramp up from the initial target of two million beneficiaries.”

    On the role of the Ministry for Industry, Trade and Investment in the implementation of the scheme, he said, “it is actively involved in the project.”

    Mr Akande said, “that ministry is, in fact the oversighting Ministry of Bank of Industry, which is the deploying agency. The office of the Minister executes the GEEP program via the Bank of Industry.

    “The governance structure of GEEP includes the office of the Vice President (National Social Investment Office), The Ministry of Trade and Investment, and the Bank of Industry.”

    Speaking on measures adopted to enhance repayments, the Presidential Media Aide said GEEP has pioneered innovative solutions to drive repayment compliance.

    “Working with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the Nigerian Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS), we successfully piloted the concept of the BVN as digital collateral; and we saw repayment go up significantly on the MarketMoni and FarmerMoni loans.

    “For TraderMoni, beneficiaries can pay back at any commercial bank in the country just like a NEPA or WAEC bill; all they need to provide the bank teller with is their phone number. We also developed and successfully piloted scratch cards as a repayment option for beneficiaries who stay kilometres away from the nearest banks in their community. The cards are loaded the same way Telco recharge cards are loaded, thus requiring no new learning curve.

    “This improved repayment received compliance to the extent that in January, the Bank of Industry began second level disbursements – disbursements of N15,000 – to beneficiaries in Lagos, Borno, Ogun and Oyo states for trader who had successfully paid back their first N10,000 loans,” Mr Akande disclosed.

    According to him, “GEEP’s vision (in the long term) remains to empower the over 30 million MSMEs in Nigeria with interest-free, collateral-free loans.”

    The GEEP programme, a component of the Buhari administration’s Social Investment Programme (SIP) has since inception about two years ago, impacted many lives, improved living conditions and expanded opportunities for ordinary Nigerians to do petty trading as well as small and medium scale businesses.

    Under the Trader Moni scheme, an initial N10,000 loan is given to petty traders and once they repay within six months, they can receive a new N15,000 loan and when they repay that they can get another N20,000 loan until they get as much as N100,000

  • FG spends N49 billion on school feeding programme

    …Investigates officials in Benue, Niger states

     

    The Federal Government on Thursday disclosed that it has spent N49 billion on feeding of pupils in public primary schools in 24 states in the last two years.

    The Special Adviser to the President on National Social Investment Programme (NSIP), Mrs. Mariam Uwais, briefed journalists in Abuja.

    According to her, a total of N220 billion has been released within the period for the implementation of the four major components of the programme.

    Read Also:7.6m children are fed daily under FG’s school feeding programme – Osinbajo

    The programmes included N-Power, NHGSFP, NCTP and GEEP.

    While the Federal Government budgeted and appropriated N500 billion for the 2016 fiscal year and the same amount in 2017, she said that, only about N140 billion was released in 2017 while N80 billion was accessed by the NSIP in 2016.

    The NSIP which was created in 2015 was officially launched in 2016 to deliver social economic support to disadvantaged Nigerians across the country.

    Uwais also explained that about 8.596 million pupils were currently being fed by the Federal Government in 46,247 public primary schools in 24 states of the federation.

    According to her, through the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme, 90,670 Nigerians have been engaged and empowered as cooks while over 100,000 local farmers have also been linked to the programme to supply locally sourced farm produced.

    “We have created a value chain with significant economic benefits to the micro economic development of the states. The value chain offers additional benefits of job creation and increased livelihood outcomes for both cooks and small holder-farmers, hence improving livelihood and the local economies,” She added.

    Mrs. Uwais said that government was having challenges with the implementation of the school feeding programme in Niger and Benue states.

    She said already some officials in the programme in the two states have been handed over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) while one of the officials have been recommended for the prosecution.

    “The National Social Investment Office is ably empowered to suspend the programme in any state where the prescribed standard is reported to have fallen below expectation until a redesigned and realignment is achieved,” the presidential aide said.

    The objective of National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme is to provide one nutritious, balanced meal each school day to 5.5million pupils in classes to One to Three in the public primary schools across the a country.

    Government says that it has achieved 30 percent improvement in school enrollment in the country since the commencement of the programme.

  • Osinbajo to inaugurate MSME clinic, GEEP in Osun today

    Osinbajo to inaugurate MSME clinic, GEEP in Osun today

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo will today launch the Nationwide Small and Medium Enterprise (MSME) Clinic and the Government Enterprise Empowerment Programme (GEEP) in Osun State.

    The MSME Clinic, a scheme under the Office of the Vice President, is targeted at helping small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to play critical roles in re-energising the economy.

    A statement by the spokesman of the state Ministry of Commerce, Industries and Cooperatives, Ismail Adekunle Jayeoba-Alagbada, said the Vice President will lead the Federal Government delegation to Osun State to officially unveil the MSME Clinic and the GEEP.

    The statement said the GEEP, also called MarketMoni, is an enterprise intervention programme of the Muhammadu Buhari administration to provide soft loans for small businesses at no interest to farmers, artisans and petty traders.

    GEEP provides soft loans between N25,000 to N250,000 to beneficiaries to catalyse their businesses and provide positive engagements for many Nigerians who hitherto had faced problems of unemployment.

    The MSME had earlier been set up in Aba, Ilorin, Sokoto, Jos, Katsina, Calabar, Abeokuta, Abuja and Uyo.

  • FG disburses N380m loan in Abia

    FG disburses N380m loan in Abia

    The Federal Government through the Government Entrepreneur Empowerment Programme (GEEP) said it has disbursed N380 million to develop micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in Abia.

    Uzoma Nwagba, Chief Operating Officer of GEEP made this known on Friday during the disbursement of GEEP Moni Market Loan to beneficiaries of the scheme at the International Conference Centre, Umuahia.

    He said:”We want to disburse 30,000 loans in Abia in this year alone; as long as you are qualified you will be entitled to it”.

    “This programme is meant for alleviating poverty and putting money in the hands of the people at grassroots to empower them. The focus is on women and youths.”

    Speaking at the occasion, Tola Johnson, Technical Adviser to Vice-President on MSMEs, described the initiative as a strong partnership between the Federal Government ,the state government and different  parastatals.

    Johnson also said tthat the progress of the scheme would be monitored to ensure that the objective for establishing it was achieved.

    In his speech, the Governor of the state, Okezie Ikpeazu, thanked the federal government for initiating a programme that would strengthen SMEs in the state and urged the beneficiaries to utilise the loan appropriately.

    Ikpeazu disclosed that the state government would organise regular training programmes for the beneficiaries to ensure that the programme would be a success in Abia.

    In separate interviews with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), some beneficiaries expressed delight over the opportunity they had received to grow their businesses.

    Mrs Adanma Ogbonna, a beneficiary of the programme said that the money would enable her to grow her business, promising that she would make her payment on time and in full.

    Mr Osinach Chigbu, another beneficiary, said that he had received a bank transaction alert which indicated that the loan had already been paid into his account.

    Chigbu expressed hope that the programme would go a long way to improve the livelihood of the people of Abia. (NAN)