MFS accelerated financial inclusion in pandemic

Mobile Financial Service (MFS) was introduced in the country over a decade ago, aiming at accelerating people's access to finance by banking the unbanked, but did not receive proper attention before the outbreak of Covid-19 in early 2020.

The pandemic and its subsequent curbs on people's movement gave a huge shot in the arms of the digital financial ecosystem as the number of MFS accounts surged by some 3 crore in a little over one and a half years up to the end of December last year, says research institute Unnayan Shamannay.

While addressing an event held Saturday to disclose the findings of a survey, entitled "A decade of Mobile Financial Services (MFS): Post-Corona field reality" on Saturday, Unnayan Shamannay Chairman and former governor of the Bangladesh Bank Atiur Rahman said the number of MFS subscribers was around 8 crore when the first Covid-induced lockdown was put in force in March 2020 and the number crossed 11 crore at the end of December last year.

Ahsan H Mansur, executive director of Policy Research Institute; Khondaker Sakhawat, founder and executive of Unnayan Shamannay; former executive directors of the Bangladesh Bank Dasgupta Asim Kumar and  Abul Kalam Azad also spoke on the occasion.

The survey was basically conducted on three levels – the Moniar Char as a marginalised area, several localities from Dhaka metropolitan to Jamalpur as intermediate area, and the slums in the Beribadh area under Hazaribagh police station in Dhaka and in Karwan Bazar.

Khondaker Sakhawat presented the reports of the survey, conducted by Unnayan Shamannay and Knowledge Alliance.

He said the MFS service has gained momentum in the char areas during the Covid period. Electricity connection, mobile phone network, and above all, the overall improvement in quality of life of the people of char areas, has played a special role in this, he added.

According to the survey, the number of MFS accounts opened by char people has increased significantly during the pandemic, which is mainly attributable to the payment of government assistance and social security allowances to MFS accounts. However, in all the char areas that have been brought under the coverage of electricity, many people now pay their electricity bills through MFS.

Ahsan H Mansur asked for further easing MFS transactions and increasing their scopes. Increasing the use of apps will reduce the amount of cash-outs and at the same time will reduce the dependence on agents, he said.

Mentioning that Bangladesh is now at a much advanced stage in terms of MFS services, he told the event that the central bank is going to launch a new app by this July, through which everyone will be able to transact with everyone.

Emphasis should be placed on encouraging the use of MFS in other financial transactions apart from cash-in and cash-out, he said, adding that it is possible to move forward to the establishment of "cashless society" through proper use of MFS.