By Providence Obuh

There is no age limit for accessing loans from Micro-finance Banks (MfBs) as is perceived by entrepreneurs who intend getting one for their micro, small or medium enterprises.  Vanguard findings have shown that as long as you are economically active, you can access loan from any MfB of your choice, as is reposed upon them to serve those at the bottom of the pyramid.

“As long as you are economically active, we are there to support, that is the drive of MfBs, no age policy limit implemented by banks but you are assessed by your ability to engage in economic activity,” said Chairman, Accion MfB, Mr. Patrick Akinwuntan. Meanwhile, there are three categories of people in the banking analogy: the banked, under-banked and the unbanked.

Describing the analogy, Akinwunmi said, “In each of our major cities, you have three categories: the banked, under-banked and unbanked, the under-banked is such a large population, they have a bank account but they don’t have access to financial services. He went further to say that there are lots of differences between the two.

For example, he said, “If you earn less than N100,000 per anum and you walk into a traditional bank and say I need support for X or Y, they will tell you stories, but if you come to Accion MfB, we have the ability first, to understand that, the fact that you earn less than N100,000 per anum does not mean you do not have the capacity to engage in financial activities and improve your life your self and from that background we are ready to support you.

that is why the average loan in our company is just about N100, 000 and if you look at most other big financial institutions, average loans are close to a million or two but here we are talking of micro loan.

“So even in bigger cities where we are operating, we are meeting the needs of the under-banked and the unbanked, we are really opening the doors for access to financial services to people who are low income earners but very active in building a future for themselves and that is what we are here to do,” he said.

Speaking on the N50 million Micro Small and Medium Enterprises Development Fund (MSMEDF) intervention fund received by the bank, he noted that the fund has been fully disbursed, saying, “We have fully disbursed the entire N50 million and we disbursed it to the education sector to support micro entrepreneurs in the sector and we will be approaching the Central Bank of Nigeria for the next tranch and so we will continue to add value. The education sector is absolutely critical just as the agric sector and other sector that we play actively in,” he said.