Hadiatou Diallo Barry, the banker invested in the financial education of women and youth in Guinea

After 15 years of experience in the banking sector, Hadiatou Diallo Barry founded Akiba Finance in 2019, a digital microfinance aimed at women and youth in Guinea.

Akiba Finance is one of the first digital microfinance in Guinea, an institution Hadiatou Diallo Barry created after several years in the banking sector.

She graduated from the ICN Business School in France in 2002 and worked in several pan-African banks, such as UBA, Eco Bank and NSIA Bank, where she was responsible for sales of treasury products at Eco Bank from 2008 to 2009; then responsible for wholesale and retail banking at UBA Group from 2009 to 2012 and Managing Director of NSIA Bank from 2013 to 2016. This experience enabled her to develop expertise in financial inclusion and support for women and very small enterprises (VSEs) and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

After realizing that most banking products on the Guinean market are not adapted to the vulnerable fringes of society, especially women and youth, she left her position as Managing Director of NSIA Bank in 2019 and founded Akiba Finance. The institution aims to “support gender equality and the empowerment of vulnerable populations by enabling them to have access to financial solutions to initiate or develop economic activities,”writes the institution on its website.

Among its innovative services for women/youth in Guinea, the institution offers savings products such as the traditional tontine, which is very developed in Africa, as well as small loans on mobile phones. It also works to increase the financial education of women and youth.

One year after its creation, despite the covid outbreak, the institution has enabled more than 30,000 women to access savings accounts via the digital tontine, financial education and financing. By 2025, the Guinean businesswoman, through her institution, aims to promote the empowerment and financial education of more than one million women.

Since 2020, she has also been administor at Telenum Guinea, which is part of the Canal Plus Group. In 2017, she also became CEO Managing Partner of Southern Rivers Capital, an Africa-Asia strategic advisory firm specialising in the African market and women’s access to finance.

Hadiatou Diallo Barry is also committed to girls’ education through her association “Let girls shine” created in 2016, which gives girls from disadvantaged backgrounds the opportunity to access schools of excellence.

In 2022, she was given the « Woman Entrepreneur of the Year Award » at the African Champion Forum.