Gates Foundation Gives $2.2M for Banks in Africa
Puget Sound Business Journal, December 1, 2005
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has funded Opportunity International with a $2.2-million grant to develop a chain of new commercial banks for the poor in Africa. Oak Brook, Ill.-based Opportunity International plans to start new banks in Rwanda, Kenya, Nigeria and Ethiopia by 2008, and an additional seven banks in other African countries by 2015.
The hope is that those banks would serve 2.8 million poor entrepreneurs, 1.7 million savings customers and 14.1 million insurance recipients, according to a news release.
“Opportunity International’s efforts in Malawi and Mozambique will provide thousands of poor Africans with financial tools to rise out of poverty and will demonstrate that rural Africa is a viable market for microfinance,” said Sylvia Mathews, executive director of the Seattle-based Gates Foundation.
