Aishah Ahmad, the Deputy Governor in charge of Financial System Stability at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), has said that the apex bank is set to review the Payment Service Vision (PSV) 2020.
While speaking at Electronic Payments Incentive Scheme Efficiency awards held in Lagos, Ahmad said the move to review the scheme is in furtherance of CBN’s payment system objectives and in response to the developments in the system.
“The CBN is undertaking a review of the PSV 2020 (created to provide a sound regulatory framework that supports innovation, protects consumers and promotes financial stability). The proposed refreshed strategy is tagged PSV 2030.”
According to Ahmad, the payments system had changed significantly and continues to change.
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Citing data provided by the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS), Ahmad said ATM transactions rose by over 196 per cent (295 million in 2013) compared to, 875 million in 2018.
Point of Sale transactions rose by 3,076 per cent (from nine million in 2013 to 285.89 million in 2018). Electronic transfers through web rose by 2,440 per cent (from two million in 2013 to 50.8 million in 2018).
Contrastingly, she added that paper-based payments transactions using cheques declined by over 35 per cent between 2013 and 2018 (14 million transactions conducted using cheques in 2013 relative to nine million transactions in 2018).
How the scheme was introduced
In March 2007, the CBN launched the PSV2020. Through the implementation
of the original PSV2020 and subsequent activities of CBN and the banking community, Nigeria has witnessed an impressive growth of electronic payments and a move from the dominance of cash as a means of payment.
In 2013, CBN initiated a further formal assessment of the payments market, resulting in the PSV2020 Release 2.
CBN’s PSV2020 objective
The original PSV2020 carried the overall objective to make the Nigeria payment systems ‘Internationally Recognised and Nationally Utilised’.
The existing infrastructure was assessed against the international best practices defined by the Bank for International Settlements, and to encourage usage of electronic payments.