A 36-month European Union funded project "PlaNet Finance" was launchedon Wednesday.

Poor populations in Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso and Mali, initially excluded from classical banking services now have a new tool through which they can benefit from these services at reduced cost, gain access to loans as well as insurance services.

This is through a 36-month European Union-funded project, "PlaNet Finance" a provider of services for financial inclusion that officially went operational in Yaounde yesterday October 2. It will help to create and develop revenue-generating activities and protect from life's risks.

Officially launching the over FCFA 1.377 billion project, Posts and Telecommunications Minister, Jean Pierre Biyiti-bi Essam, said providing financial services to the population deprived of classical banking opportunities and helping migrants to channel home their money through official sources, would be another way of boosting socio-economic development.

The General Manager of CAMPOST, Hervé Beril, disclosed that 10 per cent of his company's resources come from financial transactions and PlaNet Finance will be an added advantage given that migrants will easily channel home their money through CAMPOST postal offices, 90 per cent of which are in rural areas. According to Adrien Champey, Director of Development and International Network at PlaNet Finance, the project offers a full set of services to microfinance operators, notably technical assistance in financial inclusion, business development services, microfinance plus programmes, which link microfinance to social development programmes like health, education and environment.

"We are in partnership with the postal networks of Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso and Mali in order to provide an affordable system for remittances. So, it is Africa-Africa remittances-based through the postal network;" he said. The Ambassador and Head of the European Union Delegation to Cameroon, Raul Mateus Paula said until now migrants have been offered exorbitant costs of transferring money, a situation which discouraged most of them, obliging some to embrace informal ways which do not in any way benefit development.