Metropol, Mobipay and G-analytiX announce the signing of an agreement to collaborate on the creation of Agrilife financial identities for individuals, small businesses and groups engaged in agricultural activities.
Agrilife was conceived by Mobipay to improve the lives of farmers by enabling them to benefit from receiving appropriate financial services on a timelier basis and at lower cost by increasing visibility and liquidity within the supply chain. For financial services providers, Agrilife offers a mass, potentially high volume and value, channel to market to deliver products, e.g. credit, savings, insurance, etc., that farmers were previously excluded from either due to costs or lack of a financial identity.
Combining the holistic data captured by Agrilife on the characteristics, productivity and financial transactions, together with the credit related data gathered by Metropol, allows the financial identities of individuals, small businesses and groups engaged in agricultural activities, to be created, i.e. an Agrilife score, using the innovative expert modelling techniques of G-analytiX.
The resulting Agrilife scores may be used for three main purposes:
To assign stored-value limits within Agrilife for each farmer that allow instant value to be obtained for production (actual and forecast) and use that limit for various purposes, e.g. input credits, healthcare, education, subsistence, credit repayments, insurance premium payments, regular savings and even cash (in the form of mobile money);
To provide financial services providers with a farmer's Agrilife score to assess the risk and suitability of a specific product;
To provide financial services providers with aggregated Agrilife scores to assess the risk and suitability of a specific product for groups of farmers allowing them to underwrite specific financial services products on a bulk basis that can then be cost effectively distributed in smaller parcels via Agrilife to the farmers at an appropriate price point.
Mr Felix Musau, CEO of Mobipay, comments on the collaboration saying, "with some 75% of the working population of Africa involved in agriculture, improving the lives of farmers and facilitating growth in trade through enabling technologies is a mission we are very proud of and we are extremely excited to be working with Metropol and G-analytiX to lead the way in Kenya toward that objective."
Mr Sam Omukoko, Group Managing Director of Metropol, elaborates further saying, "Metropol's vision is to be recognized as the most respected total credit solutions provider n the region. By facilitating the migration of credit in the agriculture industry from the informal to the formal financial services sector, we will come a long way to fulfilling our social and economic responsibilities as a trusted enabler of credit worthiness assessment."
Mr Alan Goodrich, Managing Director of G-analytiX, concludes "establishing a financial identity for every farmer is a complex undertaking requiring some sophisticated and non-traditional techniques. However, we are confident that we are in the right place at the right time to finally crack the nut with the support of Mobipay and Metropol. Together we have an opportunity to make a real difference to the prosperity of farmers."