West Africa: IFC, Orange Bank Africa ink partnership deal to increase digital lending for Small Businesses

The International Finance Corporation (IFC), the World Bank’s arm for the development of the private sector in developing countries, has signed a partnership agreement with Orange Bank Africa (OBA), Orange Group’s digital bank, to “enable the smallest businesses in West Africa to access the financing they need to grow”.
As part of the deal signed on Monday in Abidjan-Cote d’Ivoire, IFC says it will provide a risk-sharing facility to help OBA scale its digital lending operations to Micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) in Côte d’Ivoire and then to Senegal and other parts of West Africa, once OBA has a license to operate in those countries.
“The facility will guarantee 50 percent of a portfolio of eligible short-term loans of up to the local currency equivalent of $30 million originated by OBA to MSMEs, enabling OBA to provide an estimated additional 300,000 loans by 2025,” the Washington-based institution said in a statement.
IFC is also set to continue to provide OBA with advisory services to strengthen its risk management procedures, further enhance its digital product offering, and improve customer experience. Per a World Bank report known as MSME finance gap report, 63 percent of MSMEs in Senegal and 57 percent in Côte d’Ivoire experience constraints when accessing a loan or line of credit.