Biashara Sacco made remarkable growth last year despite the coronavirus crisis.
Chairman Joseph Njamuku on Saturday said the Sacco did not close any of its branches. Neither did it lay off some staff members nor reduce salaries.
“The Sacco managed to stay afloat and even report positive growth in its financial performance,” he said.
Njamuku spoke during an annual general meeting at Nyamachaki Primary School.
Biashara asset base rose from Sh1.729 billion in 2019 to Sh2.07 billion in 2020, representing 19.7 per cent growth.
The loan portfolio grew from Sh1.37 billion to Sh1.56 billion, loan disbursed from Sh1.518 billion to Sh1.69, core capital from Sh480.3 million to Sh593.2 million, while the customer base increased from 118,627 to 145, 526.
The financial institution also gave dividends at 18 per cent and interest on deposit at 12 per cent. Sh29.8 million will be paid out.
“We were also fully licensed to operate agency banking services by SASRA following a successful pilot implementation,” he said.
“We managed to open a satellite office in Mairo-Inya along the Nyeri-Nyahururu road in September and at the beginning of this year we also opened Mwea Satellite in Wang’uru town, Kirinyaga county.”
They have also installed and developed an electronic document management system last year and that has enabled them to scan and feed over a million documents into the system at all its branches to ease information exchange.
An 11th branch will be opened in Nakuru town this year upon the finalisation of a feasibility study. It was to be opened last year, but the decision was shelved.
Other activities included establishing more satellite offices in Kitengela, Kenol, Murang’a, Chaka and Timau town and more banking agencies.
“Our main emphasis this year is to implement our recovery plan concentrating on our core business of selling loans and insurance products through robust marketing campaigns to potential and existing members,” Njamuku said.
The Sacco is also in the process of drafting an MoU with the government of Nyeri to cover all markets in the county to enable traders to use their stalls and kiosks to acquire loans.