The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has approved a rewards scheme for eNaira users, including merchants. The rewards include providing merchants with the required promotional materials, subsidising the current Merchant Service Charge by 50% and activation of a nationwide sensitisation which early business adopters of eNaira can leverage on to market its wider adoption.

Recently, CBN’s officials confirmed that the eNaira platform can now facilitate payments using QR Codes, USSD, Wallet ID, and eNaira Wallet tag. Value added services on the platform include branch/sub wallets, employee management, as well as interoperability with other enterprise applications. With the eNaira, the CBN seeks to enable businesses and households across and outside Nigeria to make fast, efficient, and reliable payments.

Perks of using eNaira Some of the expected benefits arising from the adoption of the eNaira include deepening financial inclusion, improvement in the efficiency of the payments system, enhancement of cross-border payments and remittances, improved trade integration, a viable option for the distribution of stimulus and government interventions and improved transmission of monetary policy. Through the evolution of offline payments channels like agent networks, USSD, wearables, cards, and near field communication technology, the eNaira platform would give access to financial services to the underserved and unbanked segments of the population. So far, the eNaira has reached over 840,000 downloads, with about 270,000 active wallets comprising over 252,000 consumer wallets and 17,000 merchant wallets, according to official data.

Volume and value of transactions on the platform have reached above 200,000 and USD 9. 4 million, respectively. How eNaira helps increase business income Company representatives explained that for instance, the availability of eNaira payment option on ecommerce merchant platforms such as Remita is expected to complement the existing digital payment system, translating to about 50% increment in ecommerce transactions and at a lower cost.

Also, the implementation of cross-border transactions in phase 3 of the eNaira project is expected to increase cross-border trade by about 30%. It is also expected that lower transaction cost would increase the usage, in terms of transaction volume and value of eNaira, and improve income generation by businesses. .