Speed up Women business guidelines -Says Speaker of Parliament

Kampala-Uganda--Speaker of Ugandan Parliament Rebecca Kadaga, has asked Ministry of Finance Planning and Economic development to speed up the development of regulations that guides commercial banks in the Implementation of chattel ACT, necessary in supporting women to access business loans from financial Institutions.

“The Law is in place but up to date no single Ugandan has mortgaged chattels with commercial banks to obtain credit. What most banks say is the lack of guiding principles that they must follow when considering chattels as collateral,” said Kadaga during a two days Business Development workshop for Women Entrepreneurs in Kampala.

She said Parliament passed the Act in 2014 but many banks are not accommodating chattels as collateral, which she said has hindered women in Business from accessing financial credits from banks.

“This has hindered the growth of their businesses,” said Kadaga.

The government enacted the Chattels Securities Act, 2014 to reform the secured transactions regime in Uganda. The Act regulates the making and enforcement of security interests in chattels and repeals the Chattels Transfer Act, Cap. 70 that was in use prior to July 2014.

The Chattels Securities Registry plays a critical role in establishing a modern chattels securities regime, which promotes the use of movable property assets such as Livestock farms, furniture crops gardens as collateral for loans and other types of credit.

To ensure that Micro Small and Medium Enterprises utilize the system, Ministry of Finance Planning and Economic Development through the Financial Sector Deepening Uganda (FSDU) and Uganda Registrations Services Bureau (URBS) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in 2016 to implement a comprehensive Chattels Securities Registry.

But up to now, Micro, Small and medium enterprises have not used such collateral system to access loans from banks to get comment from the custodian of the ACT URSB was futile as the telephone contact for the communication officer at the registry was off by the press time.

Kadaga noted that most women lack collaterals like Land titles, cars log books but at their homes majority own properties which can be mortgaged in the bank as security to enable them have access to financial support from the financial Institutions.

She said women like their counterparts the Male need to access to financial services if they are to prosper in Business.

Available Information from the Private Sector Foundation Uganda ( PSFU) indicates that Uganda has great number of women entrepreneurs especially in the Agriculture, Health and Education sectors but their businesses are not growing because majority lack business development skills , Financial resources and Limited Knowledge on the availability of market for their goods and services.

This has thus created the need for support from both Government and the private sector.

PSFU Executive Director Gideon Badagawa urged government to come up with a special fund in the Ministry of finance to finance 100% women who are in business since the largest number cannot afford the expensive loans on the market.

“Although the country’s Economy is not doing badly, the market price for loans from commercial banks are not favoring women who are in business.

“The special funds which the government established in the Ministry of Gender has not been of great value especially to women in the rural areas yet they need to benefit from the Government facility,” Badagawa told the East African Business Week.

According to Centenary Bank’s Executive Director Fabian Kasi the Bank through the women investment clubs has managed to support over 3000 individual women and 182 women groups under the Cente super woman product.

“I urge the business community in Uganda and particular the financial sector to innovate and develop products and services that will empower millions of women in the country and inspire socio- economic transformation in our society,” said Kasi.

By SAMUEL NABWIISO , Thursday, June 01st, 2017


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