African youths have business ideas but lack funds – AfDB boss – Newstrends
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African youths have business ideas but lack funds – AfDB boss

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African youths are faced with lack of funds to turn their brilliant ideas into viable businesses, President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Akinwumi Adesina, has said.
He therefore urged governments and private sectors on the continent to support large-scale youth businesses with needed funds.
Adesina said this on Monday at a virtual high-level roundtable discussion on ‘Scaling up Financing for Youth Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Africa’.
He said leaders must go beyond sermonizing about creating jobs by funding the capacities and entrepreneurial drive of the youths in Africa.
He said, “We must grow, finance and support large scale successes of youth-led businesses in Africa.
“Existing financial institutions have failed to meet the needs of this rapidly growing population of the continent.”
He also said, “This is due to lack of appropriate financing instruments; archaic credit risk assessments; focus on collaterals which the youth do not have; and lack of long-term financing horizon.
“That can deploy different types of financing instruments, from debt, equity, quasi-equity and guarantees over the life cycle of the businesses of the youth.”
According to Adesina, the continent has several programmes directed at improving the skills of the youth by countries, supported by bilateral and multilateral finance institutions.
He said though such programmes might have helped to impart some skills to support entrepreneurship, the youths were still faced with financing challenges to turn their ideas into viable businesses.
He said, “It is time to put the capital of Africa at risk on behalf of the youth.
“It is time to create new financial ecosystems that are able to support the businesses of the youth, grow them, and unlock the latent demand for financing by millions of the youth.
“This will help to turn Africa’s demographic asset into an economic asset for Africa, and for that, we must nurture the businesses of young people.
“We must tackle market failures and missing institutions that prevent the youth entrepreneurs from reaching their potential.”
He noted that with a new financial ecosystem around the youth “that was systemic, scalable and sustainable, Africa would create youth-based wealth and jobs across the continent.”
Arancha Laya, minister of foreign affairs, European Union and Cooperation, Spain, noted that entrepreneurship was recognised as a driver for economic growth but pointed out that there were too many hurdles confronting intra-African trade.
“In this endeavour, I believe it will be crucial to give youth access to appropriate financing mechanisms, capacity building and implementing legal and institutional reforms to address the barriers that young people face in accessing corporate financial markets,” she said.
In its Job for Youth in Africa Strategy, AfDB plans to create 25 million direct and indirect jobs and empower 50 million youth over ten years.

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CBN raises commercial banks’ capital base to N500bn

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CBN raises commercial banks’ capital base to N500bn

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has increased the minimum capital requirements for commercial, merchant and non-interest banks.

The CBN increased the capital base for commercial banks with international licences to N500 billion, while national and regional financial institutions’ capital bases were fixed at N200 billion and N50 billion, respectively.

This was announced in a statement on Thursday, noting that the increase was due to prevailing macroeconomic challenges and headwinds.

The statement signed by Haruna Mustafa, director, financial policy and regulation department at the CBN.

It said the upward review would enhance the banks’ resilience, solvency and capacity to continue to support the growth of the Nigerian economy.

Also, the CBN raised the merchant bank minimum capital requirement to N50 billion for national licence holders.

The financial regulator said the capital base for national and regional non-interest banks is N20 billion and N10 billion, respectively.

To meet the minimum capital requirements, the CBN advised banks to consider the injection of “fresh equity capital through private placements, rights issue and/or offer for subscription”.

The CBN also suggested merger and acquisition (M&A), as well as upgrade or downgrade of licences.

“The minimum capital specified above shall comprise paid-up capital and share premium only. For the avoidance of doubt, the new capital requirement shall not be based on shareholders’ funds,” it stated

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Tinubu orders creation of single-digit tax system

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Tinubu orders creation of single-digit tax system

President Bola Tinubu has directed a creation of a single-digit tax system with a maximum of nine taxes for a company or an individual.

Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Zacch Adedeji, disclosed this in Abuja while speaking with the management team of Guinness Nigeria who paid him a visit.

A statement on Wednesday by Dare Adekanmbi, Special Adviser on Media to the FIRS chairman, quoted Adedeji as saying, “The President gave a directive that he wants a single-digit tax in the country, meaning that the maximum number of taxes we will have after the work of the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms will be nine taxes.”

The statement added that the plan was aimed at having a conducive environment “created for businesses to flourish and grow the economy.”

 

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Naira gains further against dollar

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Naira gains further against dollar

The Naira rose further in the official market on Tuesday, trading at N1,382.95 to the dollar.

According to data from the FMDQ’s official trading portal, the Naira rose by N25.09, or 1.78 percent, from the previous day’s rate of N1,408 versus the dollar.

On Tuesday, total turnover was $245.58 million, up from $222.15 million on Monday.

Meanwhile, at the Investor’s and Exporters (I&E) window, the Naira traded between N1,486 and N1,300 against the dollar.

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The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had, earlier on Tuesday at its 294th Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), raised Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) by 200 basis points from 22.75 per cent to 24.75 per cent.

CBN governor Yemi Cardoso said that was meant to tackle the nation’s rising inflation.

Naira gains further against dollar

(NAN)

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