Mobile Phones as Mobile Banks and Credit Outlets: The Experience of Farming Households in Rural Southwest Nigeria

There is no gainsaying the fact that the increasing awareness and penetration of information and communication technologies (ICTs) into the developing world has transformed the economy of these countries. In fact, the banking sector in many of these countries is not spared. In Nigeria for instance, there has been a lot of awareness and transformation brought about by the ICTs‘ revolution. Notable among these is the introduction of mobile and e-banking especially into the banking industry. This paper was based on the study conducted to examine the extent to which mobile phones have aided financial services among farming households in rural southwest Nigeria. Data for this study were collected from a random sample of 360 farming households in Ekiti and Osun States. Descriptive analysis of socioeconomic characteristics of respondents showed their average age to be 45 years with only about one third (34.7percent) of them having tertiary education. While about 38.3 percent had no formal education, the rest had primary (15.8 percent) and secondary (11.2 percent) education. Distribution of respondents by the kind of services conducted through their mobile phones indicated credit acquisition in the form of transfer of recharge cards which are later converted into money as the most priotized. Next to this is getting information about personal account information (debiting and crediting) while making business transaction through mobile phones was the least patronised of all the services provided. A tobit analysis performed to ascertain the correlates of usage of mobile phones as mobile banks and credit outlets revealed age, years of formal education, membership of cooperative society/social groups, gender, poverty status, household size, location and access to power (electricity) as important determinants. While the coefficients of age (p<0.10), years of formal education (p<0.01), membership of cooperatives/social groups (p<0.01) and were positive, those of gender (p<0.05), poverty status (p<0.01), household size (p<0.00), location and access to power were negative. Thus, as the years of formal education increases, the more the usage of mobile phones as mobile banks/credit outlets and membership of cooperative society enhances the likelihood of farming households‘ usage of mobile phones for these services. However, as household size increases, income per-capita declines (poverty level soars) and this to a large extent reduces the likelihood of using mobile phones as outlet for financial transactions. It is therefore suggested that effort should be geared at building capacity of farming households through education. This is because education enhances earning potentials of farmers through adoption of modern farming practices and technologies. Also, cooperative activities should also be encouraged among farming households to increase awareness since cooperative societies and social groups provide avenues for training on new inventions and other technologies that can better enhance the living conditions of members.