By KENNEDY MUPESENI –
CETZAM Financial Services will mobilise K100 million in the next three years to meet the financial demand of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the country, chief executive officer Kelvin Milambo has said.
Currently the micro financial institution has the capacity to finance projects by the SMEs to the tune of K20 million on a yearly basis with more than 9,000 clients.
Mr Milambo said CETZAM to meet the demand of SMEs in the country; the company had embarked on resource mobilisation which would see more SMEs access the loans from the institution.
“The demand for financial services among the SMEs is so huge that is why CETZAM wants to mobilise K100 million by 2017 to meet the demand of financial services by our clients across the country,” Mr Milambo said.
He said most clients were being turned away not because they did not have good project proposals for funding but due to limited capacity by CETZAM.
Mr Milambo said CETZAM would continue working with cooperating partners to mobilise grow the capacity and support the economy at large.
He said it was CETZAM’s mission to commercially transform active and deserving clients who have limited capacity to grow their businesses by providing access to micro finance services.
“Our initial business was lending to groups which constituted typical marketeers and with time we have tracked and monitored most of them and have seen them grow into bigger businesses which are impressive,” he said.
He also said the creation of Credit Reference Bureau has reduced loan defaulting by the SMEs.
“The default rate by the SMEs has reduced due to the introduction of Credit Reference Bureau which shows one’s credit profile because they think if they fail to pay back the loan it will still reflect wherever they try to borrow the money,” Mr Milambo said.
He said the training SMEs undergo has helped reduce loan defaulting as they trained on good business practices to help remain in business and enable them repay the loans.