»» One of the most challenging problems for SMEs across Africa is cash flow. Imagine delivering goods or services to a client and having to wait for 30, 60 or even 90 days for payment. In most instances, you’d have pre-financed the deal yourself and now you need money fast to settle creditors, pay salaries and service growing company running costs. In the meantime, you hold out nervously, feeling the powerful pinch of the cash-flow gap. It’s a vulnerable, nail-biting time when many a good company has undeservedly gone bust.

Everyone agrees that Africa requires healthy, cash-positive SMEs and entrepreneurs to boost development. So what will it take to remedy the problem and allow good businesses to grow and thrive?

IT’S AFRICA’S TIME travels to Ghana where over 80% of the economy rests in the hands of SMEs and where Standard Chartered Bank has come up with an inclusive Vendor PrePay solution to this all-pervasive problem.