The first national payment card for Nigeria, called AfriGo, has been unveiled by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement Systems (NIBSS).
The CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, stated at the virtual launch yesterday that the card was created to take into account regional differences that the current card products have not adequately addressed.
The card, which works like other international payment cards, is intended to increase financial inclusion in the nation and lessen reliance on foreign cards, according to Emefiele.
He claimed that by obtaining an AfriGo card, Nigeria joined other nations that have local cards, like China, Russia, Turkey, and India.
He pointed out that the functioning of the local cards will provide Nigerians more options while not preventing them from using the current foreign cards.
Regarding the advantages of the National card, the governor of the top bank noted that AfriGo offers a chance to incorporate the unorganized sector of the economy into the financial system.
He said that by doing this, Nigerian banks would pay less to produce cards and wouldn’t need as much foreign currency to buy foreign cards. The Deputy Governor of CBN and Chairman of NIBSS, Aisha Ahmad, also discussed the benefits the card will bring to Nigeria.
She said: “With the implementation of the National Domestic Card Scheme, the industry will reap potential benefits which include improved transaction security, better pricing opportunities, reduced demand for FX and less pressure on the Naira, locally relevant partnerships and offerings developing local skills in card and payment space.”
“Other advantages include a boost to financial inclusion, value retention, flexible and innovative scale, and a source of national pride.”She added that based on the global card ownership statistics report, the Nigerian adult population owns about 32 per cent and three per cent of Debit & Credit cards.
“This ranks Nigeria as the 75th in the world in debit card to population ratio and 114th in the world in credit card to population ratio.
“Nigeria has a low card-to-population ratio when it is benchmarked globally, and this has a major impact on the government’s drive to aggressively boost financial inclusion.”
According to Ahmad, the AfriGo card was created by AfriGopay Financial Services Limited, an NIBSS affiliate that holds a CBN license. The Company is in charge of implementing and overseeing Nigeria’s National Domestic Card Scheme.
Analysts claim that the new Domestic Card Scheme is a strong national program designed to meet the unique needs of Nigeria’s payment industry and offer cutting-edge products specifically for the Nigerian market and beyond.
The promotion of payment innovation, improvement of domestic and international interoperability, and enhancement of the suite of products and solutions offered by banks and other financial institutions, such as debit, credit, virtual, loyalty, and tokenized cards, were said to be some of the ways they claimed the scheme would transform the domestic and African payment landscape.
They claim that the National Domestic Card, which will soon be distributed to over 200 million Nigerians, offers special value propositions such as improved data sovereignty and transaction security, better pricing opportunities, decreased demand for foreign exchange, improved financial access, and support for the development of a strong and inclusive digital economy.
