The Government has revealed plans to allocate a further Ksh.10 billion to the Hustler Fund. The digital financial initiative was launched by President William Ruto last year to provide loans to small businesses in the country that have always struggled to access financing from local banks.
Speaking while delivering his first budget in the Kenya Kwanza government, Treasury Cabinet Secretary Prof Njuguna Ndung’u also revealed that the Hustler Fund has so far disbursed Ksh.30.8 billion.
He also added that Ksh 1.5 billion has been saved as mandatory basis while KSh17 million has been saved on a voluntary basis
The Hustler Fund was designed to improve financial access to responsible finance for personal, micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs). It is a creation of the draft Public Finance Management (Financial Inclusion Fund) Regulations, 2022 and was President Ruto’s key promise during the campaigns.
The Fund has been divided into four products. These include Personal Finance – (KSh 500 to KSh. 50,000 depending on your scoring), Micro Loans, SME Loans and Startup.
On June 1st, during the 60th Madaraka Day celebrations, the President launched the second Hustler fund product. The new product is aimed at facilitating Kenyans access to funding through groups.
“To promote inclusion, the Hustler Fund is going to deploy groups such as chamas and Saccos overcome exclusion and barriers to participation in credit, savings, social security, health insurance and other socio-economic amenities.” the President said.
”This is how we will use policy and technological innovation to mainstream our way of life. We are committed to leveraging fintech in ensuring that no one is left behind in the financial and entrepreneurial inclusivity revolution,” he added.
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