The UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF), with funding from the European Union Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF), is announcing a new partnership under the GrEEn Project with PayAngel, an African market remittance and cross-border payment specialist, to allow remitters in the diaspora to remit money conveniently and safely to institutions, organizations, merchants, and vendors in Ghana.

Remittances are a vital source of income for many households in Ghana. Research reveals that Ghana is the second highest recipient of remittances in Sub-Saharan Africa, with remittances amounting to US $ 4.5 billion in 2021 alone, representing 5.9 percent of the country’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product). Despite the importance of remittances, both senders and recipients of remittances still face significant challenges in transferring and receiving funds: high transfer fees, lack of infrastructure, poor exchange rates, and lack of access to financial institutions, among others, have forced remitters to resort to sending their funds to families in Ghana through friends and middlemen leading to problems.

There is a unique opportunity to make remittances more accessible and to build on these volumes to further contribute to the financial resilience of vulnerable groups. To respond to the country’s challenges and opportunities, the European Union has mandated UNCDF to work with the private sector to improve access to and usage of financial services, with specific attention to remittance-linked services that could benefit both people living in the areas covered by the GrEEn project as well as key diaspora groups. Under this framework, UNCDF designed the partnership with PayAngel: a global fintech platform that delivers convenient and reliable remittance services; PayAngel will enable remitters to seamlessly pay directly for goods and services in the Ashanti and Western regions, save and invest in financial institutions back home. Remitters will also have the opportunity to remit for specific expenses of family members, such as school fees and medical bills, among other important expenses.

UNCDF Technical Specialist Arianna Gasparri said about the partnership, “The untapped potential of remittances is huge in Ghana, especially in the Ashanti and Western regions. The partnership with PayAngel comes at a crucial time as we want to support innovative business models that drive the adoption of formal channels and identify new use cases for remittance-linked services that contribute to youth and women empowerment. By providing formal and convenient avenues by which diasporas and residents can send and receive remittances, we hope to make remittances more available and affordable for youth, women and returning migrants, paving the way for more inclusive formal financial ecosystems.”

As part of the GrEEn Project objective of creating an enabling environment for returning migrants to contribute to their local economies, PayAngel will enroll several of them working with partners to help them take advantage of markets they may have developed in their former country of residence by providing them with an international payment platform.

CEO (Chief Executive Officer) of PayInc group, Jones Amegbor, said, “The simplicity and innovation offered by PayAngel within the digital payments processing space will allow merchants to process payments from the diaspora easily. Our core model is to connect Africans to their home countries using technology that delivers payments speedily to recipients in Africa; we are excited to partner with UNCDF in achieving this.”

UNCDF stands ready to support the private sector in Ghana and help providers expand, reach new markets, or launch new products: by de-risking the initial investment needed by financial service providers such as PayAngel to develop and scale up their products for the benefit of people at the last mile.

“This material was produced with the financial support of the European Union through the European Union Emergency Trust Fund for Africa (EUTF). Its contents are the sole responsibility of UNCDF and do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union.”