Governor: Financial literacy for farmers

 THERE is still a big population in East New Britain that needs to know about banking facilities and services, the province’s Governor Ereman ToBaining Jr says.

Speaking at the Financial Inclusion Expo in Kokopo last week, ToBaining said ENB was one of very few provinces in the country with a good number of established financial institutions.

This was because ENB was an agricultural-based business province where the majority of the 328,000 population were involved in more than one form of agricultural activity to encourage cash flow opportunities.

Agricultural activities there range from cocoa and coconut farming to fishing and cash crops.

ToBaining said many village farmers in the province had turned into the formal banking system through Bank South Pacific’s rural programmes, ANZ’s GoMoney, Wespac’s instore banking, Saving and Loans Society and microfinance banks.

However, the majority of farmers continued to operate without using bank services and facilities, he said.

“There is a bigger concern with many of our people regarding financial competency, where people still do not have all the financial information they need to invest their money wisely,” he said.

ToBaining said the ENB provincial government was assisting through various provincial programmes and projects through collaborative efforts with churches in the province to ensure that people get listing benefits from the services, which were offered by banks and financial institutions.