Access Bank launches creative sector loan to support growth in entertainment industry
Nigeria’s largest lender, Access Bank, has commenced disbursement of loans that will give big and small players in the creative business access to affordable credit. The loan facility will target cinemas, TV and radio stations, films, music, content production, tech and fashion startups and existing business.
The groundbreaking initiative is under the Creative Industry Financing Initiative of the Central Bank of Nigeria, which was announced a couple of months back by the apex bank. Access bank has said that the first tranche of the CIFI loans worth N20bn, would be made easily accessible to the borrowers in the sector.
This is a major sell for media and entertainment companies who used to borrow as high as 20 to 25% for term loans with stricter conditions.
Bidemi Adeboye of Access Bank said stakeholders in the creative industries such as fashion, Information Technology, movie production, movie distribution, music and software engineering student could access the loans.
“When all documentations were completed and the loans approved, the bank would ensure the beneficiaries got the funds within two weeks,” he said.
He added: “The CBN wants to create jobs, develop local capacity, preserve foreign exchange and ensure empowerment in the entertainment industry.
“It is more interested in providing infrastructure funding such as film house, equipment, studio, auditorium, which will make it easier for the entertainers to operate at lower cost and be able to make profit.”
He explained that the loan had maximum interest rate of nine per cent per annum and a repayment period of up to 10 years.
According to him, those who would access the loans should come up with business plan or statement; they must be registered and should be doing what had economic benefits.
Chizoma Okoli of Access Bank said that the CIFI loan was introduced by the CBN to support the creative sector. She said the bank decided to organise the forum with the stakeholders in the entertainment industry, to get more ideas from them on how best they could disburse the funds to them, and the documents they would need.
Music star, Oladapo Oyebanjo, popularly known as D’banj, urged the bank to make the loans easily accessible as promised.
He said: “Most times when we apply for loans, it usually takes up to six months for us to get such. This will be a good development if we can access the loans within two weeks.”
The recent effort of Access Bank to develop a specific product for the creative sector will be an addition to the government-owned Bank of Industry, BoI’s creative industry credit programme that has funded the expansion of several media and entertainment companies.
A compelling case for these kinds of direction is that foreign media giants and tech companies are aware that the Nigerian creative sector is full of untapped potentials. Late last year, video-streaming giant, Netflix made its first acquisition of Nigerian content with a purchase price for LionHeart at $5 million.
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