A two days financial inclusion expo is set to kick off this Friday and Saturday.
Its being organized by the National Financial Inclusion Task Force and Pacific Financial Inclusion Programme (PFIP).
The event will take place at the National Art Gallery in Honiara.
Leading up to the event a lot of interest has been generated with the confirmed participation of the three commercial banks, insurance service providers, telecommunication companies, National Provident Fund, Solomon Post, other financial institutions, NGOs, savings clubs, SIWIBA, the ministry of women, Inland Revenue department and other stakeholders.
The event will be inaugurated jointly by the Acting Australian High Commissioner, Dave Peebles and the Governor of the Central Bank of Solomon Islands, Denton Rarawa.
The inauguration is set to take place at 9am on Friday and will be preceded by a march by the participating organizations in their corporate colors which will be led by the Royal Solomon Islands Police Band.
The march past will start at 7.30am at the Honiara city council roundabout and end at the venue of the event.
The event is organized to promote financial awareness among the general public and increase financial literacy through workshops that will be conducted during the two days.
Besides all the participating institutions will be putting up stalls promoting their financial products and services and customers can get all their questions answered at these stalls.
Quiz and speech competitions will be held for school children and there are attractive prizes for the winners. Public quiz will also be held at regular intervals during the event and will focus on general awareness of financial products.
Being the first of its kind in the country, it is expected that a large number of children, youth, women and public will visit the expo grounds and benefit from the campaigns that will be held.
Solomon Islands has already achieved its medium term targets of providing access to financial services to over 70,000 people and is now looking at new targets.
Financial inclusion is an important development tool that provides access to appropriate and affordable financial products and services targeted at the low income households with a view to help them to save money, get micro loans, insurance, remittances and other such services in a sustainable manner.
The expo is being jointly organized by the National Financial Inclusion Task force under the Central Bank of Solomon Islands and PFIP – a Pacific-wide programme helping low income households gain access to quality and affordable financial services and financial education.
It is jointly managed by the UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
PFIP receives funding from the United Nations, Australian Government and the European Union. The Programme operates from the UNDP Pacific Centre in Suva, Fiji and has offices in Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea.
