Olufunmi Fagbulu
Across Africa, a significant economic transformation is taking place through ordinary transactions. It happens when a market trader receives a digital payment for the first time. It happens when a small business sells to a customer outside its immediate community. It happens when an entrepreneur begins to build a reliable record of revenue and cash flow. In each case, digital payments are doing more than replacing cash. They are opening doors to the formal economy and giving more people the ability to participate in commerce. The progress is measurable. Account ownership in Sub-Saharan Africa increased from 49 percent of adults in 2021 to 58 percent in 2024 according to data from World Bank. The region also has the highest use of mobile money accounts in the world. This growth is creating new opportunities to save, transact and build greater financial resilience. Yet public understanding of the organisations enabling digital payments has not always kept pace with this change. In Nigeria, many people know Visa mainly as the name printed on a bank card. For some, the brand is most closely associated with premium cards, international travel and affluent consumers. That perception captures only one part of the picture.
What sits behind the card
Most people know Visa as the logo on a payment card. In reality, Visa is the technology and payments network that connects banks, merchants, fintechs and consumers. While banks issue Visa cards and manage customer relationships, Visa helps transactions move securely and reliably between everyone involved. Today, Visa’s network connects around five billion payment credentials, more than 14,500 financial institutions and over 175 million merchant locations across more than 200 countries and territories.
Why does this matter? Because a strong payments network creates opportunities far beyond making a purchase. It enables a merchant in Lagos to accept payments from more customers, gives an entrepreneur the confidence to sell online, helps fintechs bring innovative products to market, and allows consumers to pay securely wherever they choose to shop. The more connected the ecosystem becomes, the easier it is for businesses of every size to participate in the digital economy.
One network, many customers
One of the biggest misconceptions about Visa is that it primarily serves affluent consumers. In reality, Visa’s ecosystem is designed to support people at every stage of their financial journey. Across Nigeria, Visa works with banks and financial institutions to offer a range of products that meet different customer needs. Everyday consumers use Visa Classic and Visa Debit cards to pay bills, shop online, withdraw cash and make purchases securely from their bank accounts. Customers looking for additional spending power and lifestyle benefits can access Visa Gold and Platinum cards, while frequent travellers and high-net-worth individuals may choose Visa Signature or Visa Infinite cards, which offer additional benefits.
A recent launch like the Visa Signature Debit Multi-Currency Card and the Visa Value Naira Debit Card introduced with FirstBank, demonstrate this approach in practice. One product caters to customers who travel and transact internationally, while the other is designed for everyday spending and digital payments within Nigeria. That distinction matters because financial inclusion is not about giving everyone the same product. It is about ensuring that a university student, a salary earner, a market trader, a small business owner and a frequent international traveller can all access payment solutions that meet their needs. Different products may serve different customers, but they all connect to the same secure payments network that enables people and businesses to participate more confidently in the digital economy.
Why digital acceptance matters for small businesses
The same principle applies to merchants. For a small business, the ability to accept digital payments can bring immediate benefits. It gives customers more ways to pay. It reduces dependence on cash. It can make sales and cash flow easier to track. It can also allow the business to sell online and reach customers beyond its physical location.
Visa works with banks, acquirers and payment partners that help merchants accept payments. It also supports technologies such as Tap to Phone, which can allow small businesses to accept contactless payments using compatible smartphones rather than traditional payment terminals. For the smallest businesses, this can reduce one of the practical barriers to joining the digital economy.
A digital payment record can also make a business’s activity more visible. Many small businesses have limited collateral, few formal records and little access to conventional credit. A consistent transaction history can help financial institutions and fintechs understand the business’s revenue patterns and design more appropriate financial services. Digital payments do not automatically guarantee access to credit. However, they can create the reliable information needed to assess businesses that have traditionally been difficult to serve. This is where the impact goes beyond convenience. A payment can become the start of a broader financial relationship, creating pathways to savings, insurance and working-capital finance.
Enabling local innovation
Fintechs are also central to this transformation. Across Africa, fintech companies are building wallets, merchant tools, remittance services and digital financial products around local consumer and business needs. Visa’s role is not to replace these innovators. It is to help them connect to established payment infrastructure and scale their services. Through initiatives such as Fintech Fast Track, Visa Ready and Visa Developer, fintechs can access technology, certification pathways, enablement partners and application programming interfaces. Visa currently works with more than 2,000 fintechs globally. This allows fintechs to focus more of their resources on solving customer problems rather than building every part of the payment’s infrastructure themselves. It also shows why Visa’s ecosystem extends beyond people carrying physical cards. A consumer may interact with a fintech application without seeing the network and partnerships working behind it. The payment experience may appear simple. The infrastructure supporting it is not.
Inclusion requires partnership
No single company can deliver financial inclusion on its own. Banks provide regulated financial services and customer relationships. Fintechs develop new products and user experiences. Mobile network operators provide connectivity and distribution. Payment facilitators and acquirers help merchants accept digital payments. Regulators create the rules that protect consumers and support responsible innovation. Payment networks help connect these participants.
The progress made through mobile money is an important example. It shows how technology, distribution and partnerships can bring millions of people into the financial system. The next stage must make it easier for wallets, bank accounts, merchants and payment networks to interact.
For consumers, this means being able to pay and receive money without needing to understand the underlying technology. For merchants, it means being able to serve customers across different channels and payment methods. For fintechs and financial institutions, it means being able to develop products that respond to local needs while drawing on secure, interoperable infrastructure. The objective is not to force every transaction through one product. It is to build an ecosystem in which different products and platforms can work together effectively.
A broader measure of progress
The future of digital payments should not be measured only by the number of cards issued or transactions processed. It should be measured by whether a small merchant can accept payments affordably and securely. Whether an entrepreneur can reach customers outside their immediate location. Whether a fintech can bring an inclusive product to market. And whether consumers can choose payment options that reflect their everyday needs. From where I sit, this is the broader role Visa must continue to play in Africa.
It includes serving affluent and internationally mobile customers, but it does not begin or end there. It also means supporting everyday consumers, enabling merchants, partnering with financial institutions and helping fintechs bring new ideas to market. The card may be the most visible symbol of Visa. The larger story is the network behind it and the economic connections that network makes possible. When digital payments are accessible, secure and relevant to the people using them, they do more than move money. They give more people the confidence and ability to participate in commerce. That is the real measure of a more inclusive payments ecosystem.
.Olufunmi Fagbulu, is the Senior Director, Merchant Sales & Acquiring, Visa West Africa