Mastercard Rallies Partners to Support MENA Small Businesses

Mastercard has launched a program designed to help small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region navigate the trade disruptions, rising energy and logistics costs, and other strains caused by the current regional conflict.

Dubbed “Built Small. Moving Strong.,” the program brings together banks, government entities and ecosystem partners to offer SMBs financial tools and digital enablement, Mastercard said in a Thursday (May 7) press release.

“What matters now is ensuring businesses have access to liquidity, actionable insights and digital capabilities that allow them to keep operating and position themselves for recovery,” Onur Kursun, vice president, commercial and new payment flows, EEMEA at Mastercard, said in the release. “This initiative reflects the power of partnership in delivering that support at scale.”

Built Small. Moving Strong. will work with government entities in the region to provide licensing support, enablement programs and targeted SMB initiatives, according to the release.

Through the program, Mastercard also partnered with entrepreneurs’ network Female Fusion to deliver a joint interactive session that offers insights and tools to support business performance.

Mastercard also collaborated with First Abu Dhabi Bank to launch an SMB commercial card, with Pemo to offer up to 500 United Arab Emirates Dirham (AED) (about $136) to SMBs that spend with their Pemo cards through June, and with RAKBANK to commit 2 billion AED (about $540 million) in additional credit limits.

In addition, Mastercard launched a campaign that offers a 300 AED (about $82) Amazon voucher to SMBs that spend over 3,000 AED (about $817) abroad using their Mastercard cards, per the release.

“When small businesses are equipped with the right tools and supported by a strong ecosystem, they don’t just withstand disruption, they emerge stronger, more agile and ready to lead the next phase of economic growth,” Kursun said in the release.

In another recently announced initiative, Mastercard said in April that it has committed to helping connect another 500 million people and small businesses to the digital economy. The company said it has already helped connect 1 billion people and 65 million small businesses over the past decade. With this effort, Mastercard aims to provide financial resilience to more of the 2 billion people who remain underbanked or unbanked.

For all PYMNTS B2B coverage, subscribe to the daily B2B Newsletter .