The Kenya Bankers Association (KBA) has signed a collaboration agreement with tech-firm Huawei Kenya that seeks to deepen financial inclusion in the banking sector through further deployment of technology and building fintech capacity.
In the partnership, KBA will work closely with Huawei-Kenya to spearhead industrywide capacity building initiatives aimed at promoting knowledge on financial technology innovation, Digital Transformation, and other ICT-related programmes in the banking industry.
Under the agreement, KBA and Huawei will also aim to promote financial inclusion activities in line with the KBA Strategic Plan for the period 2020 to 2023. Launched last year, the scheme seeks to promote access to affordable financial services through tech-aided operational efficiency.
Dr Habil Olaka, CEO, KBA, said the co-operation would go a long way in promoting the delivery of efficient banking services in Kenya through knowledge sharing programmes that will be organised by the two institutions.
“This partnership will further focus on research and knowledge sharing activities, which will supplement the research initiatives that continue to be spearheaded by the Association’s Centre for Research Financial on Markets and Policy. In this regard, the collaboration will certainly augment KBA’s and member banks’ knowledge base in engagements with diverse stakeholders from a fact-based perspective,” Olaka added.
The partnership comes on the heels of the 2020 edition of the Huawei-KBA Online FSI Summit held last month. The forum is among the initiatives Huawei and KBA are jointly implementing to promote the delivery of efficient banking services through technology under the co-operation agreement.
Will Meng, CEO, Huawei Kenya, welcomed the partnership and said technology will remain a core driver towards enhancing convenient access to financial services in light of disruptive occurrences such as the on-going Coronavirus pandemic.
“The theme of the summit was: ‘Building Banking Core Competence through Digital Transformation to Accelerate Inclusive Finance’. It is one of the initiatives we are rolling out in Kenya in partnership with the association to ensure we optimally leverage on technology to achieve affordable and accessible financial services in the regional economy,” he said.
“Beyond the COVID-19 disruption, we see technology as an invaluable enabler of financial inclusion. I have no doubt that the summit along with the KBA-Huawei collaboration has played a significant role in our collective efforts to entrench technology in our operations and sustain our contribution to the national development agenda,’’ Olaka added.
Click below to share this article