Dr Salaudeen Jubril, The Managing Director of Citiserve, a micro-finance bank, on Monday identified microfinance banks as  potent tool for poverty alleviation in the country.

Jubril made the observation while delivering a lecture at the trade seminar and annual general meeting of IMAN Trust, a non-interest cooperative society of the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital (UITH).

The financial expert, who spoke on "Islamic Micro-finance Development: Challenges and Initiatives", said that micro-finance banking was bridging the needs of low-income earners and the poor.

According to him, the beneficiaries of micro-finance banking are people whose economic standing excludes them from formal financial systems.

He said that micro-financing occurred when "access to services, such as credit, venture capital, savings, insurance, remittance, is provided on a micro-scale."

Jubril also pointed out that studies showed that the exclusion of the poor population from the formal financial system was responsible for their inability to participate in the development process.

"In a typical developing economy, the formal financial system serves no more than 20 to 30 per cent of the population," he said.

He also said that the inclusive financial system was the central goal of policy makers and planners across the globe.

Jubril said both Microfinance and Islamic finance had a common goal that emphasised ethics, moral, social, and religious factors to promote equality and fairness.

The financial expert said that the Islamic finance approach to poverty alleviation was more inclusive than the conventional finance institutions.

He said that Islamic finance provided basic conditions of sustainable and successful microfinance, blending wealth creation with empathy for the poor.

Also, in another lecture by Dr Abdulhakeem Mobolaji, a former Head of the Department of Economics, University of Ilorin, said that cooperative societies had vital roles in restoring national economic security.

In the lecture entitled "Rich Nigeria, Poor Nigerians: Role of Islamic Cooperative Societies," Mobolaji said it was reasonable for the societies to promote financial inclusion.

He said that the challenges facing these cooperative societies were numerous, but surmountable.

The don said that right attitude and continuous striving were the key driving forces to achieve these desirable objectives of saving the world from imminent and persistent global economic insecurity.