Stanbic Bank To Train Deaf SME Owners

Stanbic Bank Kenya has partnered with the Kenya Bankers Association (KBA) to offer a series of financial literacy training for hard-of-hearing SME business owners at the Stanbic Bank, Kenyatta Avenue, Nairobi. The participants are drawn from Kajiado, Kiambu, and Nairobi environs.

The training will be conducted under KBA’s Inuka SME Program, which aims to reach 200 hard-of-hearing business owners. Since 2018, the Association has been championing financial literacy training in conjunction with banks to upskill underbanked members of the public to be financially included and support business growth for banked MSMEs. Through the Inuka SME Program, more than 50,000 MSMEs have been empowered with key skills and knowledge to enhance their capacity to access bank finance and run their businesses better.

Speaking during the opening ceremony, Stanbic Bank’s Head of Business and Commercial clients, Florence Wanja, said, “Creating an enabling environment is mandatory for businesses to succeed. It is for this reason that we partnered with the Kenya Bankers Association to conduct this training. It is the first-ever training for hard-of-hearing Business owners in the Kenyan banking industry. Through this partnership, we aim to drive further entrenchment inclusion as a driver of economic development in the country.”

Stanbic Bank’s efforts to facilitate economic growth and development are guided by its purpose; Kenya is our home; we drive her growth. Accordingly, our operations are guided by our Social, Economic, and Environment pillars with a focus on 7 key areas: Financial inclusion, Job creation, and Enterprise growth, Sustainable finance and Climate change, Infrastructure development, African trade and investment, and Education and Health.

The Kenya Bankers Association has been a driving force of inclusivity in service delivery and has championed product development targeted at the deaf communities. For instance, they previously partnered with the Financial Sector Deepening (FSD) Kenya, and Deaf eLimu Plus launched the Deaf Elimu Banking App, a self-training tool for bank-environment Kenyan Sign Language.

Speaking during the launch of the training, Kenya Bankers Association Chief Executive Officer Dr. Habil Olaka said that this is a significant moment for the sector in advancing financial inclusion for deaf business owners. “The series of training reaffirms the industry’s commitment to supporting unbanked persons with disabilities to have knowledge on how to sustain their business in the long-term and bolster their ability to access credit from banks,” he said.

Florence Wanja also noted, “Innovation is at the heart of everything we do; we have developed several products and services to support SMEs, including the Pamoja Trader Business Account, which has several benefits, including free cash handling for deposits below Kshs. 500,000 in addition to personalized services, with the client, only paying for services utilized.”

Globally, there is an urgent need for increased awareness of disability-inclusive development in line with the United Nations Conventions on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which promotes the full integration of people living with disability in societies. According to the Borgen Project, there have been significant positive developments for deaf people in Sub-Saharan Africa in the last decade.

Kenya has also made significant progress to ensure that the deaf members of our society have access to information. It includes the 2010 constitution that recognizes sign language as the language of the deaf, an indigenous language, and one of the languages of the parliament in Kenya. In addition, the Disability Act 2003 requires all public broadcasting stations to include sign language in their programming. However, there is room for further progression.