Mr. Taiwo Ayedun, CEO, CR Services (credit Bureau) Plc

Obinna Chima

The Chief Executive Officer, CR Services (Credit Bureau) Plc, Mr. Taiwo Ayedun, has said that Nigerian banks need rapid growth in consumer lending to catalyse growth and profitability in the industry.

Ayedun said this at a recent forum organised by the Bank Directors Association of Nigeria (BDAN). According to him, there are huge opportunities for increased credit growth and profitability in Nigeria, given the huge numbers of employed people without access to banks’ loans.

He noted that out of the 42 million Nigerians that are gainfully employed, only 8.2 million have access to loans while less than 1.6 million have loans from the banks. This, he pointed out, offers a huge market opportunity for bank lending.

According to him, the challenge however is that, banks presently prefer to lend to corporate bodies and high net worth individuals. This, he said is due to the lack of mechanism to identify individuals who are good borrowers, who will repay their loans. He said these problems were responsible for the problem of huge non-performing loans, which was the major cause of banking distress in the past.

However, he said in developed countries, these problems are solved through the services of credit bureau. “Nigeria can also overcome this problem and experience exponential growth in consumer lending with the concomitant benefits to the economy, by aggressively engaging the services of credit bureaus,” he added.
Ayedun said that for Nigerian banks to grow, and make profit, they must lend to the millions of employed Nigerians and businesses that need loans and would repay.

He said beyond this, credit bureau would also help to reduce the incidence of non-performing loans in the industry.