Mr John Awuah, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Association of Bankers (GABs), has called on bankers in the banking industry to stop using difficult terminologies when communicating to customers or when educating them on a new product or when they want to do an investment. He therefore, urged them to be deliberate with providing education on financial literacy in plain simple language.
Mr John Awuah made this known at a forum organised by the Centre for Financial Literacy Education Africa in Ghana to mark the Month of April as a financial literacy Month. According to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Association of Bankers, banks must invest in the promotion of financial literacy to enable customers to make informed decisions.
“Information is meaningless if the people for whom the information is meant for cannot interpret and make use of it. We as bankers, we have a duty that when people come, we take the opportunity to educate and make them understand exactly what banking products and services are available and we try to understand their situation and make a recommendation.”
Mr John Awuah
Emphasizing on the importance of financial literacy education in Africa, the Chief Executive Officer argued that financially literate customers tended to repay loans since they were aware that non-payment of loans increased the cost of borrowing. He moreover, indicated that financial literacy has the tendency to increase competitiveness of banks. He thus, said “Banks which accepted to invest in financial literacy campaigns could have competitive urge over their rivals through surge in patronage of variety of financial products and services.”
“Consumers would ensure assessment of their financial needs transcend day to day to include long term focus of their needs,” he iterated.
What Financial Literacy Entails
Madam Ramat Ebella Ellis, a Banking Executive, also explained that being financially literate entailed diversifying investments, researching before making investments, having high risk-tolerance, and building securities to serve as collateral for finance.
Mr Peter Kwadwo Asare Nyarko, Co-founder and Executive Director at the Centre for Financial Literacy Education Africa, in his submission noted that promotion of financial inclusion hinges on the campaign for financial literacy, which he stated requires awareness, knowledge, skill, attitude, and behaviour to make sound financial decisions.
The Executive Director made a case for the Finance Ministry to re-introduce the nationwide Financial Literacy and awareness campaign to augment the efforts of what the banks are currently doing.
It can be recalled that in 2015, the Ministry of Finance launched a nationwide Financial Literacy and awareness campaign towards the support of Government of Ghana’s comprehensive financial inclusion strategy effort. This campaign lasted for six (6) months and consolidated the existing financial policy priorities for improving outreach of financial services throughout the country.
Meanwhile, financial literacy education is done to educate the public and promote savings habits in the country. With the public better informed and sensitized, financial service providers would have less of a hustle convincing prospective clients of the need to save or invest; there would be fewer misunderstanding between clients and their financial service providers.
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