The 8th Citi-Financial Times (FT) Financial Education Summit, the most established annual international forum on financial literacy, was held on November 28-29, 2011 in Jakarta, Indonesia. With the theme “Empowering the Disadvantaged: Inclusive and Innovative Approaches to Financial Capability”, the Summit focused on how to increase the uptake of financial education initiatives at grassroots levels – microentrepreneurs, migrant workers, and low-income youth – and also explored the use of technology and media in scaling programs and reducing the cost of delivery. The roles of national frameworks and multi-stakeholder partnerships in addressing large-scale financial capability and consumer protection needs were also addressed.
In one of the panel discussions, the United States Agency for International Development-supported Rural Bankers Association of the Philippines-Microenterprise Access to Banking Services Program presented its Financial Education for Branchless Banking Project, an initiative implemented in partnership with MasterCard Foundation and Microfinance Opportunities. The presentation highlighted how the initiative is supporting rural banks’ mobile phone banking services rollout and how it facilitates the expansion of services to clients in areas that are hard-to-reach.
Around 250 representatives from non-profit organizations, financial institutions, government agencies/regulators, multilateral institutions, microfinance institutions, consumer advocacy groups, educational organizations and private business attended the Summit.
Financial education as a key component of financial inclusion and the need for a multi-stakeholder approach for the promotion of financial education were among the concurrences of the Summit.