Uganda Bankers Association on August 14, 2023, held its sixth Annual Bankers Conference 2023 at Kampala Serena Hotel focusing on trends and innovations in FinTech changing the face of Banking and financial services.

Below are the edited remarks by Sarah Arapta, the Uganda Bankers Association chairperson

On behalf of the Uganda Bankers Association (UBA), I welcome you all and thank you for choosing to make time to attend the 6th edition of the Annual Bankers Conference today 14 August 2023.

We usually hold our annual conference in the month of July, however this year, we together with the Ministry of Justice & the Judiciary co-hosted the first-ever high-level national summit on Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) on July 25 & 26, and as such had to push forward this ABC flagship event to August.

We thank you most sincerely for accommodating this change and putting aside your other schedules to join us this morning as we take stock of trends and innovations in the fintech space, changing the face of banking and financial services.

The monumental challenges we face today, from the Covid 19 Pandemic, a turbulent global macro environment, the impacts of the Russia/Ukraine war, Ebola outbreak in Uganda and most recently the consequences of the WB suspension of funding to new projects following the enactment AHA, - such challenges remind that throughout history turbulent times are often accompanied by innovation.

The technology-enabled innovations in banking and financial services (known as fintech’s) is one such example accelerating rapidly in reshaping the future of financial services and in effect blurring the boundaries of financial firms and the financial sector.

We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that has fundamentally altered the way we live, work, and relate to one another.

In its scale, scope, and complexity, the digital transformation is unlike anything humankind has experienced before and it remains distinct because of its velocity, scope, and impact. The possibilities of billions of people connected by mobile devices, with unprecedented processing power, storage capacity, and access to knowledge, are unlimited and these possibilities will continue sprouting and morphing by emerging technology breakthroughs.

The banking sector has arguably been one of the most impacted by the proliferation of disruptive technology.

• Disruptive technologies have significantly changed the way the financial eco-system operates and delivers products and services to clients by crashing barriers to entry & creating new markets for access to
• The market has equally evolved with a growing young population under 30 years old with preference for digital
• This collectively has positively impacted economic growth through expansion of access to financial services (financial inclusion) reaching underserved consumers, the unbanked and previously hard to reach areas of the
• Today, in Uganda, we have over 23 million bank accounts as of June 2023 in the system coming from under 7 million accounts in 2016, thanks to the partnerships we have with MNOs & Fintechs. (this is a whopping 70% growth in only 7 years - 16m accounts or 2.2 m accounts added into the system annually!

Digital financial services are playing a significant role in growing credit markets in Uganda in support of the resilience and inclusive recovery following the lull experienced during the pandemic.

Importantly this growth in digital lending is creating new opportunities contributing to more efficiency and inclusivity by overcoming both geographic access barriers as well other diversity related obstacles. Transforming livelihoods and helping them leap into the money economy especially inclusivity of the poor and to the benefit of women,

Over the last seven (7) or so years, the Banking industry has disbursed credit or lent out approximately sh6 trillion to over 13.3 million customers/micro borrowers via digital lending largely done via mobile phones with ticket sizes for individuals averaging from sh150,000 to sh1,000,000.

Out of the above 13.3 million customers, over 560,000 are SMEs who take between sh7m to sh10m daily, every two-three days in support of their businesses -these include banking & mobile agents, retail shop owners, suppliers, market vendors dealing in food crops & produce etc

Customers are clearly at the epicentre of this revolution and this new world of customer experiences and data-based services based on analytics requires new forms of collaboration & partnerships which, we as participants in the eco-system must embrace and make the necessary changes needed to deliver on these transformative outcomes in support of growth and development.

Every partner in this value chain brings something to the table, for example banks bring funding for lending, MNOs bring sizable and mass customer bases, reachable 24/7 (Penetration) and the fintechs bring the soft tools, solutions and service offerings combined with greater convenience, efficiency (ease & speed) as well as enabling tighter controls (safety) and spending and budgeting.

Digital transformation is however not without risks and has come with some challenges in balancing innovations with safety, safeguarding competition, financial stability, integrity, consumer protection as well as data privacy.

As means to address and tackle some of these risks and challenges that amongst others include cyber risk and fraud, the industry with the valuable support of Stanbic Bank, on March 23 of this year, held the first fraud symposium with various stakeholders outside the banking system. The output of that meeting has now been converted into a phased fraud risk mitigation framework for the industry that will be launched by Q4 this year.

The pillars in the Fraud plan include:

1. Empowering customers and end users.
2. Promoting integrity among banking and financial sector staff + partners.
3. Enhancing systems and processes among FIs & our respective partners.

Promoting collaboration among