(Business in Cameroon) - The Cameroonian government and the Islamic Development Bank (IDB) are planning to launch a project labelled “microfinance Cameroon”, which will enable to finance Cameroonian SMEs with approximately FCfa 15 billion, under conditions established by Islamic financing.

The information was revealed late last week in the Cameroonian capital, during a feedback meeting for the “Projet microfinance Nord Cameroun (PMNC)”, implemented in the northern part of the country and which enabled, over the 2006-2010 period, to inject FCfa 600 million in SME established in northern Cameroon. According to the management of the Ministry of Finance and IBD, it is the success of this pilot project which pushed the government and its partner to extend the experience to all ten regions in Cameroon.

This project, some people in the government hint, is not only meant to promote financing for SMEs, but also get the managers of these structures to be more familiar with Islamic finance, which is still hardly known in the country; even though it carries interesting opportunities for economic operators in search of financing.

BRM