NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

A United Nations agency and the African Union (AU) are pushing for cross-border mobile money payments to boost electronic trade on the continent.

The AU has been piloting the use of a common payment system in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) region and is scheduled to roll out the same across Africa by the end of this year.

The move is intended to facilitate interconnectivity between registered mobile money account owners within Kenya and across the continent, totaling 277 million according to a 2017 report.

Photo courtesy of Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion.