Somali officials on Saturday issued the country's first license to a mobile money service, bringing regulation to the widely used digital payment process for the first time. But private businesses have nonetheless flourished in Somalia, where unregulated mobile money is extensively used for most buying, selling and transfers. Mobile money services emerged 10 years ago but were never regulated. I cannot express in words how important this is.”Easy to accessAbdullahi said the mobile money service is the preferred choice of Somalis because there is a low bar for accessing it. “This issuing of a mobile money license for the first time is arguably one of the most important steps taken by Somalia since the end of the war.”An estimated 155 million mobile money transactions, amounting to about $2.7 billion a month in Somalia, were reported by the World Bank in 2018.

Source: Ethiopian News February 27, 2021 20:15 UTC