As Mauritius sets its sights on becoming a strategic payments hub for Africa-facing companies, Sandeep Chagger, the Group Chief Operating Officer (COO) of Peach Payments, highlights both the scale of payment complexity and the opportunity that the island economy is uniquely positioned to capture.
As cross-border e-commerce accelerates across Africa, one of the most persistent constraints remains payments. Fragmentation across markets, regulatory divergence, and currency volatility continue to complicate how businesses collect, manage, and deploy funds across the continent.
Against this backdrop, Mauritius is emerging as a compelling solution—not just as an offshore financial centre, but as a strategic billing and treasury hub for companies operating across Africa.
Africa’s Payments Problem: Fragmentation at Scale
As any business seeking to enter the continent knows only too well, Africa’s payments ecosystem is not unified—it is deeply fragmented. Companies expanding across markets such as Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa often face the operational burden of integrating with multiple payment providers, each with its own systems, compliance requirements, and settlement processes.
For multinational businesses, this creates a cascade of challenges:
- Multiple technical integrations across jurisdictions
- Disparate reconciliation systems and reporting formats
- Complex compliance and regulatory management
- Lack of a single point of accountability
As Sandeep notes, unless they have the correct payment partners, companies effectively end up “doing the job of a payment orchestrator themselves,” leading to increased operational costs and inefficiencies.
This complexity becomes even more pronounced for global digital platforms seeking continental reach. Managing payments across 10+ countries can quickly become unscalable without aggregation or centralisation.
Mauritius: A Natural Aggregation Point
Mauritius offers a practical solution to this fragmentation by enabling companies to centralise billing and treasury operations in a single jurisdiction.
As an established International Financial Centre (IFC), Mauritius provides several structural advantages:
1. Centralised Collection and Treasury
Companies operating in multiple African markets can channel international payments into a Mauritian entity, creating a single collection point. This allows firms to:
- Consolidate multi-country revenues
- Manage liquidity centrally
- Allocate capital efficiently across subsidiaries
“Instead of navigating restrictive exchange control regimes in individual countries, firms can deploy funds from Mauritius with significantly greater flexibility,” Sandeep explains.
2. Currency and Risk Management
Currency volatility remains a defining feature of many African economies. By centralising treasury functions in Mauritius—where the currency environment is comparatively stable—companies can:
- Reduce exposure to local currency depreciation
- Hold reserves in major currencies
- Mitigate repatriation and conversion risks
This is particularly important for investor-backed businesses, Sandeep notes, where returns are measured in USD, EUR, or GBP rather than local currencies.
3. Tax Efficiency and Treaty Network
Sandeep emphasises that Mauritius’ network of over 20 double taxation avoidance agreements (DTAAs) across Africa alone enhances its attractiveness.
“Mauritius’ emergence as a regional billing and treasury hub is reinforced by its extensive network of over 45 DTAAs spanning key global markets across Europe, Asia, the Middle East and the Americas, alongside a strong footprint in Africa with treaties in force or under negotiation with countries such as South Africa, Kenya, Ghana, Rwanda and Mozambique,” he notes.
On the strength of this extensive network of DTAAs, businesses can work with their tax advisors to:
- Avoid double taxation across jurisdictions
- Optimise tax structures within a compliant framework
- Benefit from a competitive corporate tax regime
A Strong Financial and Talent Ecosystem
Mauritius’ value proposition extends beyond tax and treasury mechanics. The jurisdiction has developed:
- A robust banking sector with over 20 institutions
- Deep expertise in accounting, compliance, and legal services
- A bilingual workforce supporting international operations
Sandeep confirms that, while advanced technical FinTech talent remains limited, the core capabilities required for billing, treasury, and compliance functions are well established.
Building the Rails: Payments Infrastructure and FinTech Ambitions
“Mauritius has already laid key building blocks for a modern payments ecosystem. Systems such as the Mauritius Central Automated Switch (MauCAS) enable 24/7 real-time payments domestically, while regulatory frameworks—including sandbox licences, payment intermediary services, payment service provider and digital banking licences—demonstrate forward intent.
“The strong presence of global card schemes and international banks further enhances the ecosystem, enabling seamless global collections and settlements, and positioning Mauritius as a credible cross-border payments hub,” Sandeep explains.
However, he highlights a critical next phase: connectivity.
To fully realise its ambition as a global payments hub, Mauritius must:
- Integrate with pan-African payment systems
- Enable real-time cross-border settlement between African markets
- Reduce reliance on intermediaries in international transfers
Such interoperability could dramatically lower transaction costs and unlock intra-African trade flows.
From Offshore Centre to Gateway for Digital Trade
Mauritius’ long-standing identity as an offshore financial centre is evolving. The opportunity now lies in repositioning as a gateway for digital trade into Africa.
Key enablers include:
1. License Passporting
Allowing FinTech firms licensed in Mauritius to operate more easily across African markets would create a powerful incentive for global players to establish a base on the island.
2. Ease of Doing Business
Streamlining operational processes remains essential:
- Faster, fully digital company incorporation
- Simplified bank account opening
- Greater alignment between regulators and banking institutions
Reducing friction in these areas would significantly improve investor confidence.
3. Access to Capital
A major gap identified is the limited availability of growth capital for firms using Mauritius as a launchpad into Africa. Addressing this—through public-private funds or incentives—could catalyse innovation and scale.
The Five-Year Vision: What Success Looks Like
Looking ahead, success for Mauritius as a global billing and treasury hub would be defined by:
- A critical mass of global FinTech and tech companies establishing regional headquarters
- Active, high-volume utilisation of payment and FinTech licences
- Seamless payment connectivity with major African economies
- A fully digital, efficient business environment
- Strong participation in cross-border payment flows and remittances
While “license-only” entities might still approach Mauritius, the island economy’s own emphasis must strategically shift to real economic activity and transaction volume.
A Strategic Role in Africa’s Digital Economy
Driven by a young population of over 1.4 billion and rising digital adoption, Africa’s growth story is undeniable. Yet payment fragmentation remains one of the continent’s biggest bottlenecks.
Mauritius sits at a strategic intersection: stable, connected, and institutionally mature. By positioning itself as a central billing, treasury, and payments hub, it can play a pivotal role in reducing friction, enabling investment, and facilitating trade across Africa.
“The foundations are already in place. The next phase will depend on execution, predicated on connectivity, regulatory agility, and the ability to attract real operating businesses. If achieved, Mauritius will not just support Africa’s growth story—it will help power it,” Sandeep concludes.
NOTE: This article was originally published in the FinWise Magazine May 2026 edition and is reproduced here with their kind permission.
