World Bank Approves $7.7 Million For Mobile Phone Banking In Maldives

April 17, 2008 9:45 p.m. EST

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - The World Bank on Thursday approved a $7.7 million credit to the Maldives to improve financial services for banking by mobile phones.

"The mobile phone banking project will create a single currency payment system which offers a set of mobile telephone-based accounts," the World Bank said in a press statement.

The system will enable subscribers to transfer funds to and from bank accounts and to and from telephone-based accounts, according to the statement.

"The widely dispersed population in the Maldives makes delivering financial services through traditional branch banking networks very difficult," Alastair McKechnie, World Bank Country Director for the Maldives, said in the statement.

This project will particularly help reduce the vulnerability of people living in remote areas who currently have little access to formal bank outlets, the official observed.

The credit from the International Development Association, the World Bank's concessionary lending arm, has 40 years to maturity with a 10-year grace period.