AfricaPress-Tanzania: THE total loans issued by the Savings and Credit Cooperative Societies (SACCOS), in the country increased by 11.5 per cent in the year ending September last year, a sign of rising credit to finance and stimulate various economic activities.
According to the Bank of Tanzania (BoT), Consolidated Zonal Economic Performance Report for the period ending September last year shows that the total number of loans rose to 912.45bn/-in the year ending September from 818.18bn/- extended in the corresponding period 2018.
During the period, the value of deposits, savings and loans issued increased whereas number of SACCOS and members, shares value and outstanding loans decreased.
The value of shares of the Saccos members in the country decreased 2.24 per cent to 54.52bn/-in the period under review compared to 54.52bn/- registered in the corresponding period 2018.
The total savings by the Saccos members increased to 192.82bn/-compared to 177.73bn/-in 2018, which is equivalent to 8.48 per cent change.
During the reference period, the members’ total deposits in the Saccos made 19.37 per cent increase to 46.71bn/-compared to 39.13bn/-in the period ending September 2018.
The outstanding loans of the Saccos members declined by 26.44 per cent to 234.33bn/-in the period ending September compared to 318.57bn/-registered in the corresponding period 2018.
The number of Saccos members in the country increased to 728,727.8 in the year ending period compared to 712,777 in the period ended 2018, which is equivalent to 2.23 per cent change.
During the period under review, the number of Saccos in the country decreased 4,023, which is 13.9 per cent fall from 4,676 in the corresponding period.
Saccos play important role in socioeconomic development of members and communities in general as they enable easy access to financial services to people, encourage savings, create employment opportunities, support directly community development effort like helping community access to social services, stimulate growth.
