Abstract:

The study sought to assess the factors that influence the adoption of mobile money banking and financial services in Africa. Despite the growth in the mobile money industry and its potential for the future, studies suggest that mobile money banking/financial services adoption remains low across sub-Saharan Africa. This research work employed a systematic literature review methodology, specifically, a literature-based analysis for the investigation. The researcher, for the purposes of this study, identified, selected, and critically reviewed only secondary data, which refers to data that has already been collected for some other. Twenty (20) recent articles on mobile money banking/financial services and external/internal factors, modeled by various theories concerning technology/innovation adoption, were gathered from highly recognized and profiled research databases, including Google Scholar, Research Gate, Emerald (database), Elsevier (database), Pro-quest, Scopus, and Springer. From the 20 articles reviewed, analyzed, and discussed, the number of external factors that influence mobile money adoption positively or negatively is twenty (20), while the count of internal factors that influence mobile money adoption positively or negatively is eight (8). In conclusion, the external factors outnumber the internal factors, but the internal factors are more grievous and have a significant impact on the mobile money service. The results of this research work also revealed the top five external factors researchers seem to encounter in their studies. The study provides significant insight into both external and internal factors affecting the adoption of mobile money services in Africa.

References:

[1] Elliott, R. (2019, July 8). Mobile Phone Penetration throughout Sub-Saharan Africa - GeoPoll. GeoPoll. https://www.geopoll.com/blog/mobile-phone-penetration-africa/.

[2] Laura Silver and Courtney Johnson (2018). Internet connectivity is seen as having an impact on life in sub-Saharan Africa-But the digital divide persists. Pew Research Center.

[3]  Ngugi, B., Pelowski, M., & Ogembo, J. G. (2010). M-PESA: A case study of the critical early adopters’ role in the rapid adoption of mobile money banking in Kenya. The Electronic Journal of Information Systems in Developing Countries, 43(1), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1681-4835.2010.tb00307.x.

[4]  GSMA. (2010). Mobile money for the unbanked. In GSMA: Mobile for Development Website. GSMA. http://www.gsma.com/mobilefordevelopment/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/annualreport2010.pdf.

[5] Bampoe, H. S. (2015). Mobile money adoption in emerging markets: A case of Ghana [MPhil Thesis]. http://197.255.68.203/handle/123456789/8173.

[6]  Wishart, N. (2006). Micro-Payment Systems and Their Application to Mobile Networks. Information for Development Program/World Bank. http://www.infodev.org/en/Publication.43.html.

[7]  Bose, I., Celly, N., & Joshi, H. (2011). The Indian Tiger Prowls in Africa: Bharti Airtel’s Acquisition of Zain Africa. In Havard Business Review. The University of Hong Kong. https://store.hbr.org/product/the-indian-tiger-prowls-in-africa-bharti-airtel-s-acquisition-of-zain-africa/HKU952.

[8] Lema, A. (2017). Factors influencing the adoption of mobile financial services in the unbanked population. Inkanyiso: Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 9(1), 37–51. https://doi.org/10.4314/ijhss.v9i1.

[9]  Kiconco, R. I., Rooks, G., Solano, G., & Matzat, U. (2018). A skills perspective on the adoption and use of mobile money services in Uganda. Information Development, 35(5), 724–738. https://doi.org/10.1177/0266666918788908.

[10] GSMA. (2016). State of mobile money in Sub-Saharan Africa. In GSMA: Mobile for Development Website. GSMA. https://gsma.com/mobilefordevelopment/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/2016-The-State-of-Mobile-Money-in-Sub-Saharan-Africa.pdf.

[11] Winn, J. K., & Koker, L. de. (2013). Introduction to mobile money in developing countries: Financial inclusion and financial integrity conference Special Issue. Washington Journal of Law, Technology & Arts, 8, 155. https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/faculty-articles/158/.

[12] Micheni, E. M., Lule, I., & Muketha, G. M. (2013). Transaction costs and facilitating conditions as indicators of the adoption of mobile money services in Kenya. International Journal of Advanced Trends in Computer Science and Engineering (IJATCSE), 2(5), 9–15. Corpus. http://business.tukenya.ac.ke/images/staff/transactions-cost.pdf.

[13] Pénicaud, C. (2013). State of the Industry 2012: Results from the 2012 Global Mobile Money Adoption Survey. In GSMA: Mobile for Development. http://www.gsma.com/mobilefordevelopment/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/MMU_State_of_industry.pdf.

[14] Tobbin, P., & Kuwornu, J. K. M. (2011). Adoption of mobile money transfer technology: Structural equation modeling approach. European Journal of Business and Management, 3(7), 59–77. https://www.iiste.org/Journals/index.php/EJBM/article/view/593.

[15] Odumeru, J. A. (2013). Going cashless: Adoption of mobile banking in Nigeria. Arabian Journal of Business and Management Review (Nigerian Chapter), 1(2), 9–17. https://doi.org/10.12816/0003615.

[16] Rumanyika, J. (2015). Obstacles Towards Adoption of Mobile Banking in Tanzania: A Review. International Journal of Information Technology and Business Management, 35(1), 1–17. https://doi.org/http://dspace.cbe.ac.tz:8080/xmlui/handle/123456789/269.

[17] Marumbwa, J., & Mutsikiwa, M. (2013). An analysis of the factors influencing consumers’ adoption of mobile money transfer services (MMTs) in Masvingo Urban, Zimbabwe. British Journal of Economics, Management & Trade, 3(4), 498–512. https://doi.org/10.9734/bjemt/2013/4670.

[18] Kazi, A. K., & Mannan, M. A. (2013). Factors affecting the adoption of mobile banking in Pakistan. International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147-4478), 2(3), 54–61. https://doi.org/10.20525/ijrbs.v2i3.73.

[19] Mugambe, P. (2017). UTAUT model in explaining the adoption of mobile money usage by MSMEs’ customers in Uganda. Advances in Economics and Business, 5(3), 129–136.

[20] Asravor, R. K., Boakye, A., & Essuman, J. (2021). Adoption and intensity of use of mobile money among smallholder farmers in rural Ghana. Information Development, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1177/0266666921999089.

[21] Velliaris, D. M. (Ed.). (2017). Handbook of Research on Academic Misconduct in Higher Education. Advances in Higher Education and Professional Development. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-5225-1610-1.

[22] Allen, M. (Ed.). (2017). Secondary Data. The SAGE Encyclopedia of Communication Research Methods. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781483381411.n557.

[23] Anwar, S., Bascou, N. A., Menekse, M., & Kardgar, A. (2019). A Systematic Review of Studies on Educational Robotics. Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER), 9(2). https://doi.org/10.7771/2157-9288.1223.

[24] Etim, A. S. (2014). Mobile banking and mobile money adoption for financial inclusion. Research in Business and Economics Journal, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.1.1.646.6930.

[25] Senou, M. M., Ouattara, W., & Houensou, D. A. (2019). Is there a bottleneck for mobile money adoption in WAEMU? Transnational Corporations Review, 11(2), 143–156. https://doi.org/10.1080/19186444.2019.1641393.

[26] Venkatesh, V., Morris, M.G., Davis, G.B., & Davis, F.D. (2003). User acceptance of information technology: Toward a unified view, MIS Quarterly, 27(3), 425-478. Accessed on July 27, 2022, at http://www.cob.calpoly.edu/~eli/Class/p25.pdf.

[27] Chogo, P. J., & Sedoyeka, E. (2014). Exploring factors affecting mobile money adoption in Tanzania. International Journal of Computing and ICT Research, 8(2), 53–64. http://ijcir.mak.ac.ug/volume8-issue2/article5.pdf.

[28] Ndekwa, B., Ochumbo, A. J., Ndekwa, A. G., & John, K. E. (2018). Adoption of mobile money services among university students in Tanzania. International Journal of Advanced Engineering, Management and Science, 4(3), 149–157. https://doi.org/10.22161/ijaems.4.3.3.

[29] Cobla, G. M., & Osei-Assibey, E. (2018). Mobile money adoption and spending behaviour: The case of students in Ghana. International Journal of Social Economics, 45(1), 29–42. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijse-11-2016-0302.

[30] ECDL Foundation. (2009b). Case Study on Toyota Tsusho Africa Adopting ICDL [Electronic
Version]. ICDL case studies, 1-2. Retrieved 25/11/2009 from https://portal.ecdl.org/.

[31] Oyefolahan, I. O., Ahmed, S. A., & Abubakar, A. (2014). An empirical study of customers’ adoption of mobile money transfer services in Somaliland. The 5th International Conference on Information and Communication Technology for the Muslim World (ICT4M), 978-1-4799-6242-6. https://doi.org/10.1109/ict4m.2014.7020583.

[32] Odoyo, C. O., Liyala, S., Odongo, B. C., & Abeka, S. (2016). Challenges facing the use and adoption of mobile phone money services. World Journal of Computer Application and Technology, 4(1), 8–14. https://doi.org/10.13189/wjcat.2016.040102.

[33] Adebiyi, A. A., Alabi, E., Ayo, C., & Adebiyi, M. (2013). An empirical investigation of the level of adoption of mobile payment in Nigeria. African Journal of Computing & ICT, 6(1), 196–207.