Time: 13:00-15:00 (UK Time), Wednesday, 26 May 2021
Presenter: Dr George Okello Candiya Bongomin, Makerere University Business School, Uganda
Chair: Professor Victor Murinde, SOAS University of London
Online venue: Click here to join the seminar on Microsoft Teams (For any inquiry about how to join the online seminar, please contact Dr Meng Xie: xm1@soas.ac.uk)
Abstract
Since its outbreak, COVID-19 has led to spurts of economic inactivity, leaving many households and firms without access to and use of basic services including financial services. Specifically, with the lockdown and curfew, most traditional bank branches were closed, leaving households without access to quality, affordable, convenient, and safe financial services. This study aims to establish whether contactless digital financial innovation like mobile money can promote financial inclusion in the presence of pandemic positive emotions in low income countries (LICs). The data for this study were collected from 2,737 respondents comprising of mobile money users and mobile money agents as a national representative sample selected from the four regions (north, east, western, and central) in Uganda. It was found that contactless digital financial innovation, such as mobile money, significantly promotes financial inclusion in LICs under pandemic situation. Additionally, the findings showed that use of contactless digital financial innovation promotes Covid-19 SOPs in LICs. Cognizant to the role of human behaviour in technology adoption and usage, the structural equation model in bootstrapping revealed a 4-percentage point improvement on Covid-19 SOPs due to use of contactless mobile money channel.
Accordingly, the findings could be useful in the following ways: firstly, governments in LICs may use it to promote public health concern under pandemic situations. Mobile money can allow individuals to store, send, and receive money during limited or no movements caused by pandemic health restrictions. Secondly, the use of contactless digital financial innovation may promote digital commerce in LICs under pandemic situation. Governments may use it to promote G2P (government to person), P2P (Person-to-Person), P2B (Person-to-Business), and B2P (Business-to-Person) payments under emergency situations. Besides, the findings may help governments in LICs to rethink and remove taxes levied on mobile money and other digital financial channels. Finally, this study could be a game changer for digital financial innovators to design customized financial products for use under emergency situations such as during pandemic outbreak.
Presenter
Dr. George Okello Candiya Bongomin
George holds a PhD in Finance with a focus on financial inclusion, MSc (Accounting & Finance) and B.Com degree from Makerere University. He is a Research Fellow at Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research, Makerere University Business School (MUBS). He is also a Research Grants and Partnership Advisor and Visiting Scholar at Kigali Independent University. George has published over 35 publications in top journals in finance; his current research interests are in financial inclusion, digital financial services, micro small and medium enterprises, development finance, behavioral finance, banking and finance practice, institutional economics, financial consumer protection, and business psychology.
Currently, he serves on several editorial boards and he is a reviewer for internationally recognized journals. George has participated and presented over 15 papers in international conferences in Africa, Europe, US, and Scandinavian countries. George has research collaborations with several universities, including SOAS University of London, University of Maryland, Syracuse University, University of South Wales, INPHB (Côte d’Ivoire), Virginia Commonwealth University, Laval University, Agder University, and Oslo Metropolitan University. He is a member of African Business and Entrepreneurship Research Society (ABERS), and Academy of African Business and Development (AABD). He has acted as a Principal Investigators on several projects funded by the World Bank, USAID, European Union, DFID-UK Aid, SWEDISH Government, OXFAM, ACF, GIZ/GTZ, DANISH Aid, UNCDF, and Geneva Global.
Currently, he is part of the consulting team working on the digitization of the postal services under the Universal Postal Union of the United Nations based in Bern, Switzerland. Previously, George worked with the United Nations (IOM), USAID, CDC, and ABC Children’s Funds, in various capacities, before joining academia.