In an endeavor to offer financial services to rural unbanked people of Bangladesh, Access to Information (a2i), Bank Asia Limited and Mastercard entered into a tripartite memorandum of understanding (MoU) on Monday (Oct 30).
As per the MoU, they will make digital financial services (DFS) accessible all over the country through Union Digital Centers (UDCs).
The MoU signing ceremony was held at the Prime Minister's Office at Old Airport Road in the capital.
Country Manager of Mastercard Bangladesh Syed Mohammad Kamal, President and Managing Director of Bank Asia Md Arfan Ali and Director General (Administration) of Prime Minister's Office and Project Director of a2i program Kabir Bin Anwar and other high officials from respective organizations also attended the program.
A2i will also assist Bank Asia and Mastercard in extending financial services through Union Digital Centers which already partnered with Agent Banking. It will foster creation of pro-poor digital financial products and services by linking financial service providers.
Mastercard with the assistance of a2i and Bank Asia will provide necessary technical knowledge to introduce innovative payment systems in Bangladesh by establishing a digital-payment ecosystem throughout the country.
It will be done by producing universal payment instruments for Bank Asia agents to handle e-commerce transactions from the UDCs. Mastercard would also assist a2i and Bank Asia in setting up the Mastercard co-branded payment cards.
Kabir bin Anwar said "If the government and non-government organizations work jointly, the value of government services will increase tremendously to bring overall benefit to more people, especially the underprivileged citizens."
He hoped the MoU will help to shape citizen-oriented financial products from UDCs through Bank Asia Agent Banking.
