South Asian Business news and information

Maldives government is going to launch mobile-banking in the country very soon. Upon receiving US$7.7 millions loan from World Bank in April, the government started working to set up the mobile banking system in the island country. All the banks in the country have been brought together under one system now and the residents will need not to go to the nearest branch of a bank to conduct banking transaction. Just a phone call will do everything for them.

BBC reported:

As the mobile network on the islands does not support text messaging, the system works through phone calls - which has the additional benefit of being accessible to illiterate workers.

However, there have been some questions raised about the government's role in the project.

Mobile banking has already been a system worthwhile in some of the developing countries. World Bank has funded in this project in Maldives as an experiment to see how mobile banking turns out to be in a country like Maldives.