The colloquium was conducted by Nirmali Sivapragasam. The colloquium began by that the paper is based on the T@BOP data set. The Research questions are:
The Nirmali went on to describe the mobile money deployments worldwide which includes prepaid tops, peer to peer money transfers and bill and retail payments. 20% of 1.5 bn with mobiles but wthout bank accounts will use mobile money by2012 according to Economist 2009.
In Africa, M-PESA is the most prevelavent. Others too exist. In Asia, all of the countries in the study have m-payment in use.
This paper focuses on peer to peer to transfers, in this case m-remittances. Advantages of m-remittances: For uses;
- Alternative method for “unbanked” population
- Easier, quicker and cheaper: Lower commissions, transport & related transaction costs , Resultant increase in income (up to 30% in Kenya; CGAP, 2009)
For operators;
- Increases customer base & reduces churn
- Social & economic benefits leading to brand-building
For policy makers;
- Potential reduced demand for informal money transfer methods
Nirmali mentioned that there might a reduction in illegal activity such as money laundering.
Nirmali then went onto describe the sample and how the survey was conducted. Both external and internal migrants were surveyed to find out about the usage of mobile money transfers. Usage was quite low, but awareness was high.
A logit model was constructed with awareness as the explanatory variable. The variables, income, education, mobile ownership and owning of a bank account were the significant variables at a 99% confidence interval.
Therefore these seems to be the factors having a effect on awareness.
Of external migrants, barriers to uptake were that they didnt know how to use it or that they were happy with their present mode of transfer.
The identified implications of the study are:
for operators:
- Effective marketing targeting BOP needed to: Raise awareness (Teach them through advertising), Counteract perceptions re security of transactions & ease of use
- Provision of related m-remittances services: Diversification of resources and Retention of customer base & market share
Recommendations for the policy makers are to be drawn up keeping with the countries and the institutions targeted. Policy brief to be done accordingly.
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