How To Recover From Covid-19 Loss – Sterling Bank
OMOTAYO ARAOYE
For the Nigerian economy to quickly recover in the Post Covid-19 era, Online learning in the educational system, Electronic Management Records, (EMR) in the health sector to avoid patients’ loss, agricultural development amongst others are things to leverage upon.
Sterling bank officials alluded to these facts at a virtual town-hall meeting hosted by Tunde Adeola, the bank’s Executive Director, Commercial Banking.
The webinar which revealed how Nigerians can leverage opportunities which can meet their needs in various sectors of the Nigerian economy post-COVID-19 drew participants from customers in the Southeast, Midwest and South-South region of Nigeria who plays a significant role in different sectors of the economy from general commerce to health, agric, education, manufacturing, oil &gas, transportation, and construction, among others.
The global economy has come under severe attack by the coronavirus pandemic, plunging the world into a recession that its recovery period is uncertain according to the World Bank.
One of its effects is the plunge to an abysmal low, of the prices of oil that is the world’s number one commodity and, dislocating economies of many countries like Nigeria that depend on it wholly for its source of revenue and livelihood.
Today again, the prices plunged again to Brent crude (LCOc1) dropped 72 cents, or 1.8 percent, to $40.30 a barrel by 0231 GMT, while U.S. crude (CLc1) was at $37.82, down 67 cents, or 1.7 percent
Brent crude is set to end June with a third consecutive monthly gain after major global producers extended an unprecedented 9.7 million barrels per day supply cut agreement into July, while oil demand improved after countries across the globe eased lockdown measures.
On Sunday however, global coronavirus cases exceeded 10 million as India and Brazil battled outbreaks of over 10,000 cases daily. New outbreaks are reported in countries including China, New Zealand, and Australia, prompting governments to impose restrictions again.
In Nigeria also, the number of cases reported daily has fluctuated between 500 and 600 and alarmingly increased to 779 on Saturday before cooling to 490 by Sunday. This is currently pushing governments into considering another lockdown measure to curb the spread of the virus which has now entered a community phase.
The Divisional Head, Health and Education Sector of Sterling Bank, Obinna Ukachukwu, while speaking on health and new educational opportunities, said “the Nigerian educational system would change dramatically post Covid-19 as it had thrown up opportunities for online learning”.
Ukachukwu also said, “going forward, there would be a need for portions of the educational curriculum to be online so that pupils and students could learn by watching educational videos online over and over”.
He also talked about franchising opportunities, noting that there would be opportunities for partnerships with other educational institutions to enhance competition as well as the consolidation of operations to drive down costs.
Adding that the bank would position its customers to effectively access funding that will enable them to maximize opportunities in the changing environment post-COVID-19.
Ukachukwu advised pharmaceutical companies to pool resources together to produce generic drugs and consolidate their operations. He also advised consolidation in the hospital value chain, open Electronic Management Records (EMR) and making EMR mandatory for hospitals arguing that hospitals without EMR would likely lose patients
He implored the citizenry to download Tremendoc App, a health app, to enable them to gain access to medical consultancy online also stressed the need to fund EMRs
Group Head, Agric & Solid Minerals Sectors of the bank, Mrs. Bukola Awosanya, on her part spoke on Agric Finance and agribusiness opportunities. She noted that Nigerians should be able to grow what they eat, adding that Sterling Bank has what it takes to support farmers and other stakeholders across the agric value chain.
Awosanya observed that there are huge opportunities for agricultural development in the South East of the country because the soil profile in the area could easily support the production of cash crops like cashew and oil palm which are in high demand in the export market.
She said the region is also able to provide opportunities for rice plantation and processing as well as large mechanized farming, including cassava chips for export and local consumption or industrial use of cassava starch. She added that opportunities to process cocoa into cake and butter are equally available in the region.
According to her, the region also has opportunities for poultry, hatcheries, and egg production as well as access to the market.
Awosanya said the bank has provided warehousing facilities across the country to enable farmers to warehouse their produce, obtain receipts for them which they can convert to liquidity and sell when they want.
She also talked about smart agriculture, aquaculture value chain, agro-e-commerce and financing solutions provided by the bank to meet the financial needs of prospective and existing customers from the region.
Mr. Nyong Inwang of the Transaction Banking department of Sterling Bank, who spoke on Supply Chain Finance Opportunities, encouraged distributors and suppliers who are customers of the bank to leverage the opportunities to meet their needs.
He said the bank’s distributors’ finance scheme provides customers with working capital, partner with them to take advantage of opportunities to enable them to have quick access to finance under 72 hours of up to N500 million at competitive interest rates and also by lending through Specta.
According to the Head of Transactions Banking Collections, Sterling Bank, Abidemi Asunmo, who spoke on Digital Solutions & Opportunities talked about the increased need for digitisation, global and real-time visibility, uniform control over account of clients, how clients can be paid faster, visualisation and re-imagination solutions and flexibility on how to meet clients’mandates
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