DBN; Beyond Trillions to MSME’s,
BY ABUBAKAR YUSUF
The Development Bank of Nigeria, DBN, is living up to it’s nomenclature, through carrying out it’s statutory functions, regulatory and monitoring roles of the activities of Micro, Small and Medium Scale Enterprises MSME’s beneficiaries in the country.
The positive development has led to the growth of it’s disbursement that commenced in Millions, Billions and now transmuted into trillion in 2024/2025 and may catapult to trillions going forward in 2026.
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Conversely, the Bank on inception, supported over 700,000 businesses through it’s cumulative disbursement of trillions of naira.
With the growing availement of Trillions of naira , the poverty line of MSME’s participating organizations and individuals will improve drastically and also affect positively the Gross Domestic Product GDP of the country.
This was enabled with a conducive environment, improved economy that guaranteed mass participation, government concerns in line with the Renewed Hope Agenda, RHA of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
With strict compliance and meeting the conditions by Deposit Money Banks , DMB, and Micro Finance Banks, MFB’s, the DBN provides long-term, affordable financing to eligible PFI’s for on lending to eligible MSME’s in quantum.
In line with it’s requirements, Development Bank offers the 79 accredited participating financial Institutions (PFIs), that had fulfilled Eligibility Criteria to get loans via (MSME’s).
Therefore , to be eligible to receive financing from DBN, the PFI’s is expected to meet the minimum eligibility requirements set out below on the “Cut-Off Date”.
It is also expected of PFI’s to maintain the minimum eligibility requirements throughout the Financing Period spanned for one decade.
As part of its requirements further , the DBN or its representatives will conduct an annual due diligence process to confirm that the PFI’s is not in breach of the minimum eligibility requirements, and may declare all advances to the Participating Financial Institutions,PFI’s, payable when in breach of one or more of the requirements or fails to remedy the breach of a requirements ,within any grace period allowed by the Bank at absolute discretion.
This is in line with a duly issued and valid license from the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, to carry out business as a Bank or Financial institution.
The PFI’s is also expected to demonstrate and display within the three most recent financial years, two years of profitable lending operations, with effective risk management procedures, controls, and acceptable levels of loan portfolio quality and performance.
With redoubled efforts , managerial experience and disposition of it’s management under the leadership of the Managing Director, Dr Tony Okpanachi soared up the success story.
The Bank which existed to alleviate financing constraints faced by Micro, Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (MSME’s) in Nigeria, through providing financing, partial credit guarantees and technical assistance to eligible financial intermediaries on a market-conforming and fully financially sustainable basis.
Designed to support Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSME’s) as its primary objective to thriving business conglomerates, essentially through Participating Financial Institutions (PFI’s).
Aside disbursement to PFI’s, the Bank also secured Partial Credit Guarantees, PCG, through its subsidiary, Impact Credit Guarantee Limited.
Development Bank of Nigeria , DBN offers partial credit guarantees to encourage PFI’s to lend to small businesses, thereby mitigating risk and bridging the funding gap.
It offers training and retraining programs, capacity building and technical assistance to both PFI’s and MSME’s to enhance business management, financial literacy, and entrepreneurship skills.
The Bank’s Entrepreneurship Training Programme (DETP) is a flagship initiative that has trained thousands of entrepreneurs across the country, with a view to preparing them for fund management and sane utilisation.
With goals, inclusive financing and determination, it usually disburse a significant percentage of loans to women-led 40%, youth-led 30% businesses of the 100%.
It has also launched the country’s first-ever curated MSME Data Asset, to centralize data and provide insights for better policy decisions and funding access,away from analogue and human interference in line with the global standards and requirements.
The above success story under Dr Tony Okpanachi had exposed MSME’s in Nigeria to accessment and assessment, with the process involves engaging with one of the 79 DBN Participating Financial Institutions (PFI’s) to access the loans or participating in one of the DBN’s Entrepreneurship Training Programmes, DETP for capacity building.
Written BY ABUBAKAR YUSUF on yus.abubakar3@gmail.com.
(DEMOCRACY NEWSLINE NEWSPAPER, JANUARY 24TH 2026)
