Borrowing Funds for Development Not a Crime, says CBN

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has said borrowing funds for development should not be misconstrued as untoward as developed countries such as United States of America still borrowing funds for development.

Registrar of National Collateral Registry (NCR), a department in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Bulus Musa, said that borrowing funds for development projects and other people-oriented activities by the Federal Government of Nigeria should not be condemned by the citizens, stressing that the borrowed funds, when judiciously utilised, would help to move the nation forward.

Musa, who was represented by an Assistant Director with the CBN, Dr. Xavier-Itam Okon, spoke in Benin, at a town hall meeting involving farmers and other stakeholders, with the theme: “Meeting MSME’s Safe Haven: Improving Financial Access to the Nation’s Main Economy Drivers.”

The town hall meeting was successful, in view of the CBN being collaborated with, by a German firm, Deutsche Gesellschalt for Internationale Zisammenarbeit (GIZ), which provided the technical support.

NCR’s registrar disclosed that the registry was established in 2015, thereby making access to loans easy for farmers and other investors, while using their movable property as collateral.

He said: “NCR is a creation of the CBN. In fulfillment of the CBN’s resolve to further deepen credit delivery to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), and reduce the challenges of collateral, as a requirement for loans by MSMEs, the apex bank (CBN), in collaboration with the International Finance Corporation (IFC), established the NCR.”

“NCR is a financial infrastructure that will enable MSMEs to leverage on their movable assets (equipment, machinery, vehicles, Keke-NAPEP, crops, livestock, account receivables, inventories and jewellery, etc.) as collateral for loans in their various banks.

“NCR is a notice-based registry for collateral. It is an online, centralised, and publicly available database that allows financial service providers to register security interests in movable assets, after accepting such collateral for loans, thereby facilitating lending to individuals, farmers, micro entrepreneurs, and small and medium-scale businesses.”

Musa also revealed that NCR had been enabling businesses to leverage their assets to obtain credit facilities for growth, and allowing borrowers to prove their credit worthiness, while improving the liquidity of assets, especially short-term assets, such as accounts’ receivables.

A top official of GIZ, Olawale Afolabi, while also speaking, stated that the firm had been training farmers and other stakeholders in business strategies and providing technical support.

Afolabi noted that GIZ would always look at the problems being faced by stakeholders, thereby proffering solutions to them, in order to move forward.