Bringing competition to the Ugandan remittance market through open APIs, customer-centric platforms and SACCOs

IFAD is partnering with Stanbic Bank Uganda (SBU) under the PRIME Africa initiative to promote affordable digital remittances in rural Uganda. In 2021, SBU launched a new e-wallet named FlexiPay, with a simplified onboarding process that facilitates un(der)banked clients. Leveraging on this new product, the IFAD project will enable the integration of cross-border remittances into the e-wallet at a cost that is below the market average for the Kenya-to-Uganda and Sweden-to-Uganda remittance corridors. In order to drive the adoption of the e-wallet for rural remittance recipients, the project will advance SBU’s existing strategy with savings and credit cooperatives (SACCOs) in rural areas, and train their staff in digital and financial literacy through Stanbic Bank Incubator, which will in turn train SACCO customers.

Budget:

Financed: €335,095
Co-Financed: €450,365

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Duration: 2023 ~ 2024

Project Category Financial Inclusion
Remittances & Digitalisation

Target Groups:

Remittance senders and receivers in all regions of Uganda and its corridors with Kenya and Sweden, including SACCO members.

Programme

FFR Strategic Framework

PRIME Africa

Project Goals

Enhance the financial resilience of Ugandan receiving families through cost-effective, digital channeling of remittance flows and financial literacy training.

Implementing Partners

Stanbic Bank Uganda (SBU) is the largest commercial bank in the country, with a strong access network covering rural and peri-urban areas. A large percentage of all remittances received in Uganda are managed by SBU. Project partners include TerraPay, OnAfriq, Upesi and SACCOs in Uganda.

Geographic Target

Uganda

Outcomes

Since 2023, Stanbic has focused on establishing integrations with partners to facilitate the pay-out of international remittances into the FlexiPay wallet and to the partner SACCOs.
Partnership agreements were launched with TerraPay and Upesi (linkage to media coverage) to channel remittances into the FlexiPay wallet.
The project team selected 10 SACCOs to promote digital financial literacy. The team identified these SACCOs through direct interactions with 1,500 SACCOs members from 30 SACCOs operating in rural areas (West, North, and East Uganda).
Stanbic Bank and Stanbic Bank Incubator teams designed a tailored-made financial literacy curriculum for SACCO members and launched a series of Training of Trainers (TOTs) and following financial literacy sessions.
As of June 2024, 40 SACCO staff members and leaders were onboarded as trainers and a total of 1,848 SACCO members joined the financial literacy sessions. Of these, 1146 (62.01%) were females, while 698 (37.99%) were males. A total of 409, representing 22% of the total number of training participants, were youth.

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