Syndicate content   Sanket Mohapatra's picture   Post offices
typically have strong networks across the country, in part
because of their strong orientation towards service, and are
typically more familiar and accessible to the poorest living in
remote, rural areas. In this study, Jose and Nils report that
more than 80 percent of post offices in Sub-Saharan Africa are
located outside the three largest cities in each country—in
small and medium-sized towns and rural areas where more than
four-fifth of the people in Africa live. This stands in sharp
contrast to the mainstream commercial banks that are usually
concentrated in the largest cities in Africa, and can appear
forbidding and expensive for the poor, including migrants and
remittance recipients. This provides postal networks a unique
opportunity to become key players in both international and
domestic remittances.  There is clearly a large potential for
post offices to more fully participate in providing remittances
and to bring the unbanked into the for