Saudi Arabia has witnessed the highest adoption in the Middle East and North Africa region of contactless payments through Near-Field Communication or NFC, the Saudi Central Bank has said in a statement.
The bank, which still goes by SAMA, the abbreviation of its older name Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority, said Saudi Arabia had achieved contactless payment adoption of 94 percent.
It said that this was not only the highest in the MENA region, but also above of the European Union average, and ahead of Hong Kong and Canada.
Here is what SAMA said about it on Twitter:
#Saudi_Arabia achieves highest adoption of #NFC contactless payments in MENA, higher than European average, Hong Kong, and Canada.#SAMA#البنك_المركزي_السعودي pic.twitter.com/Fb6cmJ4JUm
— SAMA | البنك المركزي السعودي (@SAMA_GOV) October 3, 2021
SAMA clarified that the country’s adoption of contactless payments was part of its strategy to build on the goals of the Financial Sector Development Program or FSDP of the Saudi Vision 2030.
The program aims to reduce cash transactions while raising electronic payments to 70 percent of all transactions by 2025.
To achieve these goals, SAMA has fully adopted NFC payments since 2016, taking steps to authorize and facilitate e-payment transactions after ensuring security in accordance with international standards and best practices.
SAMA further indicated that the relevant infrastructure supporting NFC payments has been deployed through collaboration with Saudi Payments, payment services providers, and banks.
These operations included overhauling the national payment ecosystem and replacing all bank cards and Point-Of-Sale terminals as well as ensuring that all devices endorse the technology.