Govt support key to FINTECH adoption

Stakeholders in the financial sector view the role of government in new technologies as a facilitator to build momentum in the advancement of financial technologies as opposed to government acting as an inhibitor to innovation.

Speaking during a forum that brought together players from Kenya’s financial and technology sectors, Nurucoin Kenya Strategic Advisory Director John Kamara said he expected the government taskforce on financial technologies to offer a roadmap into how the technologies can be implemented on an everyday basis in the country.

“You cannot regulate technology because technology is ever evolving.  The use of technology is what you can regulate by looking at what technologies can do in specific areas of the financial sector,” Mr Kamara said.

The need for more engagement between players in finance was however identified as a major hurdle to the adoption of the new technologies with ethical literacy emerging as the most integral part of advancing the growth of the technologies.

President of the Chartered Financial Analysts Society of Kenya Patricia Kiwanuka said the government needs to catch-up innovation to facilitate adoption.

“This technology is happening and won’t stop, the challenge to as investment professionals is to understand and bring groups with multiple-disciplines together to make a difference,” Ms Kiwanuka said.

New technologies in the financial sector in Kenya have been at the fore-front of most public debates with block chain technologies dominating proceedings due to the potential they hold in triggering economic growth in the country.

The government has moved ahead of time to explore the existing opportunities within the technologies through the setting up of an 11 member taskforce to look into Financial Technologies (FINTECH).

The taskforce is expected to report back to the ICT ministry by the end of May by giving recommendations bringing to an end the speculations as to where FINTECH in Kenya will head next.