The Central Bank of Afghanistan on April 25 granted the country’s first Electronic Money Institution license to M-Paisa, the first mobile funds-transfer service to operate in the country.
Roshan, the brand name for Telecom Development Co. Afghanistan Ltd., introduced M-Paisa in Afghanistan in 2008 as a financial-services tool for the country’s unbanked. The service had been operating under a Money Service Provider license, a spokesperson for the central bank tells PaymentsSource.
The central bank recently introduced the Electronic Money Institution licensing process in Afghanistan, and it will complement the existing provider’s license in setting the mobile funds-transfer service standards in Afghanistan, he adds.
The latest licensing program will raise the limits on transactions initiated through mobile funds transfers and widen the scope of their use by classifying telecommunication companies as money institutions when providing mobile funds transfers.
Afghans in 230 towns now may use the M-Paisa service to transfer funds, receive and repay microfinance loans, and purchase mobile airtime, an M-Paisa spokesperson tells PaymentsSource.
Consumers may access the service via Short Message Service text messaging or through an Interactive Voice Response system when calling a call-center number, he says.
More than 22 million consumers in Kenya and South Africa also use M-Paisa under the M-Pesa brand name. Vodafone Group PLC developed the service in March 2007 in association with Kenya-based mobile operator Safaricom Ltd.
Vodafone, which owns a stake in Safaricom, also is the majority shareholder in Vodacom, according to the company website. Vodacom last summer teamed with Nedbank Ltd. to launch the M-Pesa mobile cash-transfer service in South Africa (
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