The Chief Executive Officer of First Bank of Nigeria Limited, Adesola Adeduntan, has revealed that the bank is among the biggest lenders in the agriculture sector.
He spoke during a recent interview published on African Banker Magazine on the sidelines of a keynote address at the Edinburgh School of Business, Scotland.
Mr Adeduntan said he does not think the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is too interventionist.
“It is not unusual that the Central Bank intervenes in critical sectors allied to the loan to deposit ratio. It’s about economic growth, it’s about development, it’s about channelling credit in sectors that are very important for the national economy,” he said.
“Let us take agriculture – again, we are one of the biggest lenders into that sector. We found the Central Bank intervention in some of those critical sectors extremely useful and not just for us as a bank, but for the country as a whole.
“When you look at intervention in agriculture, you have to put it in the context of the size of the population. Nigeria is a country of 200 million people today. The business of feeding 200 million people is a strategic business. Everything that is being done to ensure that at least we are self-sufficient in food production is strategically important. We find the Central Bank intervention in those areas quite useful and of national importance.”
Adeduntan, a veterinary doctor by training, said he believes President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration is pro-business.
He also said he was not worried about the rise of non-traditional finance institutions, adding that FirstBank has one of the best-defined strategies when it comes to financial inclusion and that it has the largest digital banking network in Nigeria.
FirstBank operates FirstMonie Agents system with 46,000 agents who represent the bank across the country.
The agent network enables the bank to provide services to the most remote rural communities and services are supplied at a fraction of the cost of a ‘legacy’ banking model.
Adeduntan said the bank has a vital role to play in financial deepening and a distinct advantage over new entrants.
According to him, technology will play a crucial part in broadening financial inclusion. He emphasised the importance of collaborating with different stakeholders such as Non-Governmental Organisations and others dealing with those at the bottom of the pyramid, to help them reach out to different groups and also improve financial literacy.
In Edinburgh, Adeduntan spent a large part of his day visiting tech hubs around the university in the city and speaking to fintech companies.
He said FirstBank has a number of partnerships with fintech companies as well as its own Digital Laboratory developing new solutions for the bank.
