By Emmanuel Mensah-Abludo
The ARB Apex Bank has assured Rural and Community banks (RCBs) of its resolve to continue to partner with them to develop more innovative and tailor-made products to the satisfaction of their customers.
The Wa Branch Manager of Apex Bank, Michael Nyarko gave the assurance at the 40th Annual General Meeting of the Nandom Rural Bank PLC at Nandom in the Upper West Region.
Mr. Nyarko who deputised for the Managing Director of ARB Apex Bank, Alex Kwasi Awuah encouraged the Nandom Rural Bank to continue to push hard by devising the right strategies to further improve the fortunes of the Bank going forward. Mr Nyarko stressed the need for Nandom Rural Bank, in its outreach programmes, to target “bankable medium, small, micro, and individual businesses” in its operational areas to further serve the people at their door steps. Although the bank made a loss of GHS 548,955.00 in 2020, it made a profit before tax of GHS 1.31 million during the 2021 financial year, representing 339.31%.
Mr. Nyarko commended the Nandom Rural Bank for the feats chalked up and urged it not to be complacent but to endeavour to consolidate the gains made in order to achieve more going forward. Mr Nyarko equally stressed the necessity for the Bank to identify and train what he termed “a young and aggressive workforce” that can be deployed to the communities to sell products and services to potential and existing customers of the Bank.
The Board Chairman of the Nandom Rural Bank, Firmino Bergyire Aasoyir observed that in spite of the difficult economic challenges in the country, the Bank maintained a very strong financial position which reflected in increasing performance across the key financial indicators.
Deposits grew by 8.02% during the period under review, from GHS 25,489,307.00 in 2020 to GHS 27,534,443.00 in 2021; loans and advances increased from GHS 4,735,470.00 in 2020 to GHS 5,238,266.00 in 2022, representing 10.62%; and the investment portfolio also grew by 13.16%, from GHS 19,752,025.00 in the previous year to GHS 22,352,082.00 in 2022.
Total assets of the Bank also went up to GHS 34,518,251.00 in 2021 from 31,268,320.00 in 2020. The Municipal Chief Executive for Nandon, Raymond Nero commended the founding members of the bank for taking the initiative 41 years ago (in July 1981) to establish the Bank to serve the financial needs of the people.
He entreated the Bank to give priority to the agricultural sector in terms of loans, saying “majority of the bank’s clients are into agriculture”.
The MCE observed that the existence of the Nandom Rural Bank has greatly facilitated the smooth implementation of government’s flagship programmes such as the COVID-19 Alleviation programmine (CAP) loans, Planting for Food and Jobs (PfJ), School Feeding Programme and Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP), among others.
The Chief Executive Officer of the Nandom Rural Bank, Mashuud Zakaria Dumbu emphasised the importance for workers to upscale their financial interaction with the Bank so that they could be easily supported when the need arises.
Mr Dumbu announced that the Nandom Rural Bank PLC emerged as the Best Bank in Apex Instant Pay (GIP) in 2021.
