{"id":43195,"date":"2026-08-19T18:07:03","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T16:07:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=43195"},"modified":"2026-08-19T18:07:03","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T16:07:03","slug":"burundi-integrates-comesa-payment-systems-to-boost-cross-border-trade","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/burundi-integrates-comesa-payment-systems-to-boost-cross-border-trade\/","title":{"rendered":"Burundi integrates COMESA payment systems to boost cross-border trade \u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Bank of the Republic of Burundi (BRB) is accelerating efforts to integrate the nation&#8217;s banking sector into regional payment systems, hosting technical training for local financial institutions on connecting to Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa&#8217;s (COMESA) payment infrastructure.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The training focused on linking domestic banks, the National Post Office, the central bank to COMESA\u2019s Regional Payment and Settlement System and the Digital Regional Payment Platform.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The initiative aims to address long-standing friction in cross-border trade. By moving away from traditional correspondent banking networks, which often require routing funds through third-party international intermediaries, the integrated systems allow importers and exporters to execute cross-border settlements faster, at lower costs, and with reduced foreign exchange risk.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The move complements Burundi&#8217;s domestic financial modernisation, following the launch of its national instant payment system, BurundiPay. Connecting local institutions directly to COMESA&#8217;s digital payment architecture provides Burundian businesses with direct, low-cost access to commercial markets across the 21-member trading bloc.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;ChannelAfrica\/BRB&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":29542,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[44],"class_list":["post-43195","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-finance","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Central Bank Moves to connect Burundian banks to COMESA payment infrastructure","published_date":"2026-08-19 18:06:39","news_description":"Central Bank Moves to connect Burundian banks to COMESA payment infrastructure","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/43195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/43195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43196,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/43195\/revisions\/43196"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=43195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}