In N’Djamena on March 24, 2026 (ET), ifc and fintech company Cashi announced a partnership to expand digital payment services in Chad and into central Africa—an initiative framed around financial inclusion in a country where cash remains dominant and access to formal financial services is limited.
What is Ifc and Cashi actually building in Chad?
The partnership centers on Cashi’s digital payment infrastructure, described as interoperable solutions designed for low-connectivity environments. Cashi’s platform enables users and businesses to send and receive money through mobile phones, point-of-sale devices, and SMS-based tools. The platform is positioned as a single interoperable ecosystem linking users with banks, telecoms, and other financial institutions to facilitate everyday transactions.
For small businesses, the project is presented as a practical shift away from the risks and constraints of handling physical cash. The stated benefits include lower transaction costs and improved access to financial services, with the downstream expectation of revenue growth and support for job creation. The logic is simple: if payments can move reliably through tools that work even when connectivity is limited, commerce can function with fewer interruptions and fewer cash-handling burdens.
Cashi CEO Tarneem Saeed said the partnership provides upstream support that will help the company adapt its “proven, crisis-tested platform” to central Africa. Saeed also emphasized working with regulators and ecosystem partners, building trust with local merchants, and delivering tools usable in daily life even in low-connectivity settings.
Why target low-connectivity payments now—and what does Chad’s baseline reveal?
The announcement is rooted in a stark baseline: in Chad, only around 10–15 per cent of adults have a bank or mobile money account, compared with over 30 per cent across sub-Saharan Africa. That gap is central to understanding both the urgency of the initiative and the scale of the challenge.
IFC Division Director for West Africa Olivier Buyoya framed the approach as a response to markets where smartphone penetration is low, arguing that expanding access to digital financial services requires “innovative, tailored solutions. ” Buyoya described the project as support for “accessible, low-tech, and resilient architecture solutions” intended to boost access to finance for individuals and businesses in Chad and, more broadly, the Sahel.
The contradiction at the heart of the project is also its premise: digital payments are being pushed in an economy where cash remains dominant. The partnership’s design choice—mobile, point-of-sale, and SMS-based tools—signals that the project is not built on an assumption of widespread smartphones or always-on connectivity. It is built on the opposite assumption, and the rollout will be judged by whether that low-tech, interoperable architecture can deliver consistent everyday utility at scale.
Who benefits, who is implicated, and what accountability is built in?
The stakeholders named in the partnership’s description point to a broad ecosystem: individuals, merchants and small businesses; banks and telecoms; regulators; and development institutions. The immediate beneficiaries are framed as small businesses and consumers who need everyday transaction capability without relying entirely on cash.
On the institutional side, ifc is presented as the World Bank Group member focused on private sector development in developing countries, using investments, mobilization of other investors, and expertise-sharing to pursue measurable development impact. IFC is owned by 186 member countries and is described as consistently rated AAA/Aaa, and it operates in more than 100 countries. Within the partnership, IFC’s role is defined in terms of “upstream support” and a commitment to accessible, low-tech, resilient financial architecture in challenging markets.
The partnership is also explicitly aligned with a government framework: the Tchad Connexion 2030 development agenda, which identifies digitalization and financial inclusion as enablers of economic diversification, increased revenue collection, and private sector development in Chad. That alignment implicates public policy goals, not just product adoption. If digitalization and inclusion are tied to revenue collection and diversification, the public interest case depends on transparent implementation, clear regulatory coordination, and measurable outcomes in real usage—not merely in platform availability.
Verified fact: The partnership announcement identifies work with regulators and ecosystem partners as a core component, and it ties the initiative to Tchad Connexion 2030’s stated priorities.
Informed analysis: Because the initiative is framed as a route toward increased revenue collection and private sector development, the most consequential accountability test will be whether adoption reaches beyond early adopters and formal-sector nodes into the daily cash economy the project aims to serve.
The public measure of success is not the announcement itself, but whether ifc and Cashi can convert an interoperable, low-connectivity design into routine trust and repeated use in an economy where cash dominance and limited formal access are the starting conditions.
