THE FIRST “MAKING FINANCE WORK FOR AFRICA” PARTNERSHIP FORUM HELD IN ACCRA

Hon. Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu, Minister of Finance and Economic Planning has said that African governments, development partners and the private sector collectively need to work together as unified financial system to strategize implementable solutions to the development of the African financial sector.

“The key to deepening the financial sector development of Africa rests in a conscious effort of sharing best practices and to promote regional integration of financial services”, he stressed.

Hon Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu said this when he opened a two-day forum on “Making Finance Work for Africa” in Accra.

The conference which is the first for the Partnership Forum has brought together over 250 financial sector experts from all over the world to set priorities and strengthen the network of African financial sector champions.

The Partnership itself aims at supporting the efforts of African countries to accelerate economic growth and reduce poverty by facilitating financial sector development.

The themes to be discussed at the Accra Forum include capital markets, approaches to financing SMEs, financing infrastructure, branchless banking, investing in microfinance and making finance work for African women.

He said innovations in the banking sector in Africa, i.e. ICT and mobile telephony create new possibilities for provision of financial services and easy access to an extensive and large number of Africans.

“This has created an integrated financial market in Africa thereby perpetuating economies of scale which is very essential in building efficient financial and capital markets”.

To this end he appealed to all stakeholders to make financial sector development in a priority underpinned by efficient cooperation among African governments, development partners, the private sector and other stakeholders.

Mr. Louis Kasekende, Chief Economist from the African Development Bank in his remarks noted that inspite of excess liquidity in Africa, SMEs lacked access to finance, also there was also lack of funds to finance infrastructural development these are critical challenges that should be addressed by the forum.

The Chief Financial Officer at the World Bank, Vicenzo La Vie pledged the World Banks support for the partnership especially as financial sector development in Africa would lead to economic growth, increase household incomes, build assets and reduce poverty in general.

Giving an overview of the forum, Mr. Ralf Schroeder, Director BMZ, Germany said the partnership has identified four main constraints which the partnership intended to address to accelerate financial sector development in Africa.

These include omission of financial sector agenda from national and regional development plans, lack of country owned comprehensive financial sector development strategies, knowledge gaps and inappropriate application of global best practices to African contexts and lack of country leadership.

The Partnership for Making Finance Work for Africa is supported by a broad range of development partners and financial sector stakeholders.

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