- Small Business Owners Hail FG on Collateral-free Loans
There was excitement on Wednesday at the Nyanya Market in Abuja as traders hailed the decision of the Federal Government to disburse the sum of N10,000 to each of them.
The disbursement is part of the current administration’s drive to empower over two million petty traders across the country through a commercial loan scheme tagged: ‘Trader Moni’.
The scheme, being implemented by the Bank of Industry, allows each beneficiary to get a collateral-free loan of between N10,000 and N15,000.
The loan is part of the social intervention programmes of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration.
Speaking on the sidelines of the disbursement of the funds to them, some of the traders commended the Federal Government for coming up with the initiative.
One of the beneficiaries of the scheme, who gave her name as Agnes Danlami, said the funds would enable the government to empower small businesses that could not access finance from conventional banks.
This, she noted, was vital as many of them had in the past been complaining of lack of access to finance.
Danlami, who sells vegetables and tomatoes at the market, said, “This is the kind of funds that we have been clamouring for over the years to grow our business. The rate of turnover for our business is not high and as such, we can’t rely on banks to give us loans, because of the high interest rates.
“But with a collateral-free loan such as this, we can borrow money for our business and still pay back without problems. So, I commend the government for this initiative.”
The Executive Director, MSMEs, BoI, Toyin Adeniji, said the bank was collaborating with the Federal Government to empower small traders.
Adeniji stated that the project, wholly driven by the government, was expected to give N10,000 grant each to the traders to boost their business.
She said about two million petty traders would be empowered under the scheme, with each state having a total beneficiary of at least 30,000 petty traders.
She stated, “The initiative is to give capital to petty traders; as you can see, this place is full of petty traders and we want to come and create a market awareness and to encourage them to embrace the loan, and teach them the modalities for getting the loan.
“It starts from N10,000 and you can pay back between three and six months. The Bank of Industry is the executing agency and basically, we are partners of the Federal Government to implement this.
“The Bank of Industry is a strong promoter of the MSMEs in Nigeria; and so, we have created the platform to enable this programme and ensure that it goes around the entire country.”
