Primera MFBank Facilitates N5bn Financing for SMEs

Bolaji Babatunde

Primera Microfinance Bank, a fully licensed and technology-driven finance institution has extended  over N5 billion  in financing to Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) so far in 2022.   The bank, which  offers financial solutions to businesses and individuals,  it accomplished this laudable feat by strategically targeting key growth sectors in the SME space to stimulate their commercial and economic growth.

Primera Microfinance Bank further pledged to maintain robust financing lines to entrepreneurs in the economy, to enable them weather economic headwinds and surmount critical financial challenges.

According to the bank, in recognising the key role that gender-diversity and financial inclusion for women plays in driving sustainable economic growth, approximately 26 per cent of these financing lines were made out to female entrepreneurs in the current financial year, doubling the 13 per cent share recorded in 2021. These funding lines were focused on enabling small and medium-scale entrepreneurs sustain and grow their businesses as well as empower them to launch new businesses to compete in the marketplace.

Commenting on the development,  the Chief Executive Officer of Primera Microfinance Bank, Mr. Unwana Efiong Esang, said: “At Primera MFBank we are solidly committed to building the capacity of SMEs in this economy to ensure they thrive, create wealth for our people and add value to society. This is critical because according to available data, over 99 per cent of registered businesses in Nigeria are MSMEs and they contribute 46 per cent of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP), this is in addition to providing over 87 per cent of employment in our economy. So, we are very deliberate in our focus to grow this very important dimension of our economy by leveraging one of our must-win objectives of significantly improving customer and stakeholder satisfaction.”

“Our bank, through our Primera Business proposition, is proud to be championing the cause of SMEs in our economy, and in recognition of the fact that access to finance is a major challenge to SMEs, we have optimised our lending processes to make our financing lines more accessible and available in a time and cost-efficient manner to our highly valued SME clientele. In addition to these, we have established partnerships that have significantly improved on credit application support, as well as the knowledge, expertise and enabling infrastructure around SMEs through our periodically held and very well-attended Primera SME Clinics.”

 He explained that these clinics are focused on empowering SMEs and entrepreneurs with company incorporation support, financial and economic literacy, sales and marketing support, book-keeping knowledge, branding support and legal advisory for their businesses.

“We have developed a very robust and all-encompassing ecosystem to incubate SMEs to achieve market and economic success,” Esang added.

In conclusion Esang said, “the results of all our efforts have further validated and proven our concept for SME success and we fully intend to further deepen our support for small and medium-scale entrepreneurs, grow their businesses into sustainable and economically viable enterprises and thereby contribute further to the deepening and development of our economy. At Primera Microfinance Bank we truly are your fully dedicated partner for growth.”