There is a ₹ 130,000 crore (approximately USD 18 billion) retail digitization opportunity in the North East Region (NER) of India. However, nearly 80% of the Region’s 15 lakh merchants do not have digital payment acceptance infrastructure, most of them in semi-urban and rural areas, with a significant gender divide. Merchants in the NER face many challenges while using digital payments: half of all transactions fail; the process can be complicated, expensive, and not conducted in the merchant’s language. This study shows results and opportunities on digital payments over cash to capture the large retail digitization.
Impact / Outcome
Building on the efforts by local PSPs and willingness of established fintechs to partner with those having on-ground networks to accelerate payments, it will be important to establish partnerships among key private sector players based on their unique value proposition and complementarity. This can help reduce their costs and improve value proposition of digital payments in the Region.
Funding sources
Public
Key Metrics
Increase merchant digitalization opportunity
Operating model
Public-private partnershipYear published
07 September 2021 
Better Than Cash Alliance
Better Than Cash Alliance NGOs and other non-profit