Kampala 15th June 2023: Uganda Development Bank (UDB), the country’s national development finance Institution has committed to scaling up its interventions with the 2023/23 national budget allocation to the Bank.
The allocation to the Bank was announced during the 2023/24 budget reading by the Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, Hon. Matia Kasaija who revealed that UDB was assigned Shs85 billion to boost economic activities in the new financial year specifically for medium and large enterprises. Currently, the total UDB capitalization from the government is UGX1.22 trillion set to grow with the additional allocation for Financial Year 2023/24
“Uganda is on a steady recovery trajectory exhibiting better and improving performance on several macroeconomic indicators. As the country’s national development finance institution with the mandate to catalyze Uganda’s socio-economic development, these economic gains require that we scale up our interventions that aim to boost a vibrant and sustainable private sector,” noted UDB’s Managing Director, Patricia Ojangole.
To brighten growth prospects for the next financial year, UDB’s interventions will further be guided by the Bank’s Purpose Statement: “To improve the quality of life of Ugandans”, which is underpinned by the Bank’s three High Impact Goals namely.
- Building a Sustainable Agrifood System for Uganda – where UDB focuses on supporting the entire agriculture ecosystem, encompassing the full range of activities in the primary production of food and non-food agricultural products, as well as their storage, aggregation, post-harvest handling, transportation, processing, distribution, and marketing.
- Promoting sustainable Industrialization in Uganda – through which the Bank seeks to boost value addition to raw materials thereby increasing the country’s competitiveness and increasing foreign exchange earnings, through specific interventions to support agro-industrialization, manufacturing, knowledge-based and extractive industries.
- Developing a Sustainable Services Sector encompassing specific interventions to address identified sector constraints in Tourism, Health, and Education sectors, and in Science, Technology & Innovation.
In the 2022/23 budget, the Bank was allocated Shs103 billion which, buffered with resources from funding partners, facilitated exponential support to private enterprises resultantly posting a 52% increase in the gross loan portfolio, reaching Shs1,298 billion by December 2022 from Shs851 Billion in December 2021. This growth was on account of disbursements amounting to UGX776.6 billion in 2022. Additionally, the Bank registered a post-tax profit of Shs45 billion (unaudited), surpassing Shs38.83 billion in 2021.
“The Bank’s total assets currently amount to UGX1.58 trillion, growing by 19% since the beginning of 2022. This growth is largely attributed to increased funding, primarily through capital allocations from the Government and the utilization of credit lines from our funding partners, that enables the Bank to disburse credit. The Bank’s gross loan portfolio as of April 2023 is Shs1.384 trillion,” Ojangole added.
The 2022 investments created an output value of Shs3,358 billion against Shs2,445 Billion realized in 2021.
Ojangole lauded the government for its unwavering support towards the capitalization of UDB.
“Our continued growth is on account of growth in funding, mainly through capital allocations from the government and the drawdown of lines of credit from various other funding partners,” Ojangole concluded.