The fact that financial literacy of the Belarusian population is quite low is not a piece of news. Yet, for many years this problem would not be tackled.
However, certain changes make it clear that soon efforts to enhance financial literacy will be activated.
‘Dark’ people?
Specialists have long noticed: financial education of the population significantly increases competitiveness of a country, makes it more attractive to investors, and helps increase people’s well-being. Ever broadening range of financial products and their complexity as well as compulsory use of certain financial instruments in the normal life all make financial education necessary for all consumers. It is never too late to learn, the big issue is how to make studying financial fundamentals available to the general public. Many other countries also face the lack of economic education of citizens. However, in our country the situation in this sphere is lamentable: people do not use many financial services and often are not aware of them.
“At present, when the modern world`s financial system is actively developing, process of globalization is accelerating, financial instruments are becoming increasingly complicated and new financial products and services appear, it is difficult for common people to understand current trends,” Deputy Chairperson of the Board of the National Bank Sergei Dubkov explains. On the one hand, the development of the financial system improves access to financial resources and more efficient use of capital, on the other, managing this financial system becomes very difficult. “In other words, development of financial products should be accompanied by adequate enhancement of public awareness,” the expert concludes.
When a person enters a bank, as a rule, he or she approximately knows what he or she wants. However, a large part of customers do not go to banks and, do not know what services banks can offer!
There are other risks that are directly related to the lack of the Belarusians of certain financial knowledge. «For example, many people who can afford to do savings do not do them or save too little. Therefore, they do not have the so-called «safety cushion» that would help deal with emergencies such as illness, job loss, and the like», – Sergey Dubkov explains.
Depositors at a school desk
The National Bank employees acknowledge inadequate level of people`s financial education. Most often, people address to the regulator with all arguments they have with banks. According to the National Bank, in the first half of 2012 it received 1,239 complaints – a 28% rise on the same period of 2011. All of them, both written and electronic, were examined by the National Bank governor, her deputies and heads of departments. As a rule, citizens address the National Bank with questions related to lending, work of banks, ATM, kiosks and electronic money operation, foreign exchange transactions, refunding or compensating the Soviet period deposits. Out of all applications that the National Bank received in the first half of the year, 113 requests were fulfilled, explanations were submitted to 427 applicants and another 211 complaints were forwarded to other relevant organizations.
In recent years the Government, the National Bank, the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Economy, Ministry of Labor and Social Security and other government agencies have been revising their approaches to improve the situation. The National Bank has become the main driving force in this matter. The institution set up a working group to improve the financial literacy of population that handles a variety of activities. The group prepare information for the mass media, for customers to make right investment decisions as well memos for borrowers and guarantors. The National Bank establishes contacts with international organizations for financial education. For instance, in 2012 the World Bank provided technical assistance to support efforts to improve financial literacy in Belarus.
By the way
In the beginning of this year the National Bank jointly with the international organization Alliance for Financial Inclusion (AFI) conducted a research on access to financial services for households and small business in Belarus. The results of the study showed that strong efforts to involve the public in using financial services and increase their financial education are needed. In particular, it was found that 14.1 % of Belarusians still do not use any financial services and less than half of the people (47.2 %) are active or advanced users of financial services.
Never late to study
While banks are puzzled over how to improve the basic financial knowledge of their current customers, it is also important to think about training future customers, presently students and schoolchildren.
According to reports, a set of optional economic and financial courses for secondary school students was worked out including such classes as Ourselves and the Economy, A Family in the World of Economy, World Finance, Business and Market, Economy and the State, Principles of Entrepreneurship, Fundamentals of Consumer Knowledge and others.
