NTUNGAMO – Janet Museveni, the first lady and minister of education, praised Equity Bank Uganda for introducing the “Equi-Mama,” a product that specifically aids women in business.
A revolutionary lending facility created to unleash the business potential of women in rural Uganda was unveiled at the Ntungamo Municipal Grounds.
The goal of the Equi-mama credit facility is to give women access to inexpensive money, business training, mentoring, networking opportunities, and the tools they need to be successful in business.
“I asked Equity Bank to establish a branch in Ntungamo and, secondly, to offer a service that would particularly help women in the community. I wanted to test how easily our women might enter a bank and borrow money for their little companies. When we unveil the Equity Bank branch in Ntungamo District and the Equi-Mama product, which is especially made to address the needs of small-scale women and young businesses, I am extremely thankful to God for answering that prayer today, said Mrs. Janet Museveni.
“I am grateful to Equity Bank for expanding its banking services to Ntungamo District and for taking into consideration women and the youth, who have long had difficulty getting loan facilities due to their lack of credit history,” she continued.
While young people and women play significant roles in society, Mrs. Museveni emphasized that they rarely have access to credit facilities and that many of them are constrained by a lack of financial awareness regarding the goods available to support business success.
Anthony Kituuka, managing director of Equity Bank, reaffirmed the Equi-mama proposition’s ability to help women entrepreneurs grow their companies, reduce home and business risk, and obtain access to affordable financing and free financial education.
“Equi-mama was created especially to cater to the specific micro-level needs of women. In order to better understand the financial difficulties faced by women at the base of the economic pyramid and how we may assist them in overcoming these difficulties, we have adopted a customer-centric strategy, according to Mr. Kituuka.
“We have also taken steps to guarantee that the product is available to women from all backgrounds and financial levels,” the addendum continues. In order to make it simpler for women to use our services, we provide various payment alternatives and no application costs.
According to Kituuka, Equity’s free financial and entrepreneurial literacy training aims to overcome obstacles like long-term business planning, accounting, and record keeping.
Women in company will find it easier to digitally and remotely onboard thanks to financial education, which will also make access to financing much simpler.
The bank’s newest offering also provides unsecured microloans to women for amounts ranging from UGX5 million to UGX40 million. It also includes coverage for temporary or permanent disability, maternity, life, catastrophe, and fire. The bank offers its female clientele maternity care, which includes antenatal insurance, during pregnancy.
Almost 89,000 women have already received training from the Bank in various facets of business growth and development, and more than 20,000 women from various organizations have received loans as part of the program. In 2021, Equi-mama was created for the first time to help women stricken by the COVID19 epidemic.
By providing access to free financial training, the bank will help rural women strengthen their business management abilities through the product. Women will receive the information, abilities, and resources they require in order to improve their access to capital and advance their businesses to the next stage of development.
With specialized business advisory sessions, advanced business training, networking, and connecting them to financial services, investments, and markets, Equity will also offer business help to women entrepreneurs.
Mrs. Museveni inaugurated the new Equity Ntungamo branch ahead of the product launch, bringing the total number of Bank branches to 50. She was happy that an African bank was establishing strong roots and expanding to help other Africans.
