First City Monument Bank Limited - Nasira Portfolio (FMO-63765)

Countries
  • Nigeria
Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.
Financial Institutions
  • Netherlands Development Finance Company (FMO)
International, regional and national development finance institutions. Many of these banks have a public interest mission, such as poverty reduction.
Project Status
Approved
Stage of the project cycle. Stages vary by development bank and can include: pending, approval, implementation, and closed or completed.
Bank Risk Rating
U
Environmental and social categorization assessed by the development bank as a measure of the planned project’s environmental and social impacts. A higher risk rating may require more due diligence to limit or avoid harm to people and the environment. For example, "A" or "B" are risk categories where "A" represents the highest amount of risk. Results will include projects that specifically recorded a rating, all other projects are marked ‘U’ for "Undisclosed."
Voting Date
Jun 3, 2024
Date when project documentation and funding is reviewed by the Board for consideration and approval. Some development banks will state a "board date" or "decision date." When funding approval is obtained, the legal documents are accepted and signed, the implementation phase begins.
Borrower
First City Monument Bank Limited
A public entity (government or state-owned) provided with funds or financial support to manage and/or implement a project.
Sectors
  • Agriculture and Forestry
  • Finance
  • Industry and Trade
The service or industry focus of the investment. A project can have several sectors.
Investment Type(s)
Loan
The categories of the bank investment: loan, grant, guarantee, technical assistance, advisory services, equity and fund.
Investment Amount (USD)
$ 0.06 million
Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.
Primary Source

Original disclosure @ FMO website

Updated in EWS Aug 10, 2024

Disclosed by Bank Jun 24, 2024

Contribute Information
Can you contribute information about this project?
Contact the EWS Team

Project Description
If provided by the financial institution, the Early Warning System Team writes a short summary describing the purported development objective of the project and project components. Review the complete project documentation for a detailed description.

According to the Bank’s website, the objective is to support the 2024 edition of FCMB's AgriTech Venture Building Program. It is a full-fledged incubation program for idea-stage agri-companies run by FCMB. Through the program, FCMB will identify scalable and impact-driven early-stage companies and provide them with access to knowledge, skills, funding, and networks, to take their ideas to the next level.

According to McKinsey & Company, more than 60% of the population In Subsaharan Africa consists of smallholder farmers and about 23% of Subsaharan Africa's GDP comes from agriculture. However, it is estimated that the agricultural potential of the region remains untapped. The production of grains and cereals has a tremendous upside potential (two or three times), which could add 20% to the global economy. Substantial investment is needed to allow Africa's agritech sector to fully utilize its capabilities. With an estimated worth of USD 1 trillion by 2030, Africa is positioned to emerge as the leading global hub for agricultural technology (Agtech) solutions.

The purpose of this initiative is to foster and accelerate the growth of scalable agri MSMEs, which is a core NASIRA target group. By supporting early-stage Agtech companies to scale up, we will contribute to increasing agricultural productivity and, indirectly, to food security and SDG 2 (zero Hunger), SDG 8 (Decent work and economic growth), and SDG 10 (Reduced inequalities).

As claimed by the Bank, the execution of this project is not only strategic from a social impact perspective, but also from a commercial point of view. FCMB has to accelerate the onboarding of MSME companies to further expand the portfolio covered by the NASIRA RSF. Through this TA initiative, FCMB and FMO have partnered to incubate 15 scalable early-stage agri-tech businesses in Nigeria. A hackathon will precede this incubation trajectory to identify disruptive business models that address pressing problems in the agricultural sector.

Investment Description
Here you can find a list of individual development financial institutions that finance the project.

Funding: FMO NV

Financial Intermediary
A financial intermediary is a bank or financial institution that receives funds from a development bank. A financial intermediary then lends these funds to their clients (private actors) in the form of loans, bonds, guarantees and equity shares. Financial intermediaries include insurance, pension and equity funds. The direct financial relationship is between the development bank and the financial intermediary.
Private Actors Description
A Private Actor is a non-governmental body or entity that is the borrower or client of a development project, which can include corporations, private equity and banks. This describes the private actors and their roles in relation to the project, when private actor information is disclosed or has been further researched.

First City Monument Bank Limited (‘FCMB’) (Fitch: B-, Moody's: Caa1) is a Tier II commercial bank with headquarters in Lagos, Nigeria. It was founded in 1977 as a brokerage company before gaining a banking license in 1983. FCMB is the primary subsidiary (93.7% of TA as of Q3 2022) of the FCMB Group Plc (the “Group”), a full-service banking group listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. The bank provides a wide range of banking and financial services via its six main business segments: Personal, Institutional, SME, Commercial, Corporate, and Treasury & Financial Markets. The Bank is transitioning from a corporate bank into a universal bank including expansion into the the SME and retail segments. Its 2021-2025 strategy seeks to intensify the acquisition and retention of active customers (i.e. from 7.6m to 25m customers). FCMB has been a client of FMO since 2014 when FMO arranged a six-year USD 60m syndicated facility. In 2019 FMO arranged a USD 50m subordinated debt facility. Currently, FCMB is in the process of obtaining a USD 60m syndicated senior facility, of which FMO provides up to USD 20m; EFP up to USD 30m and USD 10m to be provided by FIM funds. In addition, a USD 25m NASIRA facility is being offered to FCMB to support entering into the underserved SME segments including women-owned and rural MSMEs.


Contact Information
This section aims to support the local communities and local CSO to get to know which stakeholders are involved in a project with their roles and responsibilities. If available, there may be a complaint office for the respective bank which operates independently to receive and determine violations in policy and practice. Independent Accountability Mechanisms receive and respond to complaints. Most Independent Accountability Mechanisms offer two functions for addressing complaints: dispute resolution and compliance review.

Website customer/investment: http://firstcitygroup.com

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

As part of FMO's ex-ante disclosure (disclosure of transactions before contracting), you can send requests or questions for additional information to: disclosure@fmo.nl

ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISM OF FMO

Communities who believe they will be negatively affected by a project funded by the Dutch Development Bank (FMO) may be able to file a complaint with the Independent Complaints Mechanism, which is the joint independent accountability mechanism of the Dutch Development Bank (FMO) and the German Investment Corporation (KfW). A complaint can be filed in writing, by email, post, or online. The complaint can be filed in English or any other language of the complainant. The Independent Complaints Mechanism is comprised of a three-member Independent Expert Panel and it can provide either problem-solving, compliance review or both, in either order. Additional information about this accountability mechanism, including a guide and template for filing a complaint, can be found at: https://www.fmo.nl/independent-complaints-mechanism

How it works

How it works