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Government lauds Barclays leasing
initiative
Accra, March 15, GNA - Government on Thursday lauded
Barclays Bank's initiative for being responsive to the needs
of corporate bodies by taking the lead in the industry to
finance leasing in the country.
Nana Juaben-Boateng Siriboe, the Chief Director of the
Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning said the
introduction of such facility by a bank meant that
businesses in the country now have opportunity to renew
their assets pool which would enable them to improve upon
their products and services.
He made this remark when he launched three distinctive
leasing products of Barclays to fill the demand that
companies already in the sector are currently unable to
meet.
The products, dubbed: Vehicle and Asset Finance come with
names "FlexiRent", "FlexiLease" and "FlexiLoan" were aimed
at providing alternative means of funding the acquisition of
assets instead of reliance on loans by customers.
Nana Siriboe also challenged the bank to consider designing
a similar instrument for micro businesses such as Small and
Medium Scale (SMEs) to enable them to expand, grow and add
value to their products and services.
"There are a number of these micro scale businesses (that)
need to retool their technologies and equipment to enable
them grow," he said.
Nana Siriboe told the bank to track how these new products
would cause business to grow and generate employment in the
system as well as how they could impact on government
revenue.
He urged players in the financial sector to be sensitive and
take advantage of the many good policies that government has
and continue to introduce for businesses to thrive.
Mrs Margaret Mwanakatwe, Managing Director of Barclays Ghana
said the product would not only succeed in providing
financing solutions to the private sector but also inject
dynamism into the Ghanaian leasing industry and deliver
unconstraint answer to the assets finance needs of corporate
clients.
According to her, survey by the international Finance
Corporation last year indicated the volume of equipment
financed through leasing in Ghana was below 1.5 percent.
She praised the Government and the Bank of Ghana for the new
Banking Act, which had set the pace for Ghanaian banks to
conduct leasing as normal banking business.
"This progressive regulatory development paved the way for
Barclays to boldly enter the local leasing market to help
address the capacity constraint..." she said.
Mr Greg Barclay, Head of Africa and Indian Ocean of Vehicle
and Assets Finance of the bank said Barclays would liaise
with the Ghana Leasing Association in collaboration with the
IFC Leasing Project to develop the leasing industry.
He said the vision of the bank was to have a regionally
integrated proposition, which is tailored to country
specific requirements.
The bank at the launch honoured the first three customers,
Goil Ghana Limited, Multimedia Broadcasting and Agapet
Company Limited, an advertising firm that had patronised the
new product.
GNA
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