Dissemination workshop on Movable Asset Based Lending
16 Mar 2022
Dissemination workshop on Movable Asset Based Lending
On 16 March 2022, the EDB organised a half-day dissemination workshop on Movable Asset Based Lending which was attended by more than 70 professionals (including via webinar) from the banking sector, regulatory agencies, law firms and non-banking institutions, public sector agencies, amongst others.
The workshop was held in line with the Secured Transaction Reform announced by the Honourable Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development in Budget 2021/2022, with a view to improving access to finance for businesses.
This project itself has 2 components: aligning the current legal framework pertaining to secured transaction with international best practices and the development of a modern notice-based movable collateral registry. Both the legislative framework and the notice-based registry are expected to promote and facilitate the development of efficient secured transactions systems and expand access to finance for businesses, with special focus on increasing financing for SMEs.
The Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Development, State Law Office, Registrar-General’s Office and the EDB have been working in close collaboration with experts from the World Bank. The team has carried out extensive consultations with both public and private sector professionals and the project has hit key milestones. The team is now in the phase of drafting the required legal amendments to relevant statutes to provide for the underlying legal framework. This endeavour will significantly broaden the current financial infrastructure to facilitate access to credit whilst creating the conditions that would allow the use of movable assets (such as inventory, accounts receivable, equipment, crops, livestock, etc.) as collateral to generate funding.
The workshop was led by two seasoned international experts from the World Bank, namely, Mrs Elaine MacEachern, Senior Financial Sector Specialist, FIG Global Advisory, World Bank and Professor Tom Johnson, International Legal Expert in Secured Transactions. It also saw the virtual participation of Ms Aksinya Sorokina and Jonathan Gigin from IFC, remotely from Senegal. The Patents and Companies Registration Agency (PACRA) from Zambia did a virtual demonstration of their notice-based collateral system.
