By signing a Memorandum of Understanding on 7 March 2016, the Sparkassenstiftung für internationale Kooperation (Savings Banks Foundation for International Cooperation) and the Honduran financial supervisory authority CNBS set the frame for a future cooperation to promote financial literacy in this Central American country. Gerd Weißbach, Sparkassenstiftung’s Regional Director for Latin America and The Caribbean, and Ethel Deras, President of CNBS, met in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras to sign a Memorandum of Understanding. The Honduran Vice Foreign Minister, María del Carmen Nasser de Ramos, and Dieter Lamlé, the Commissioner of the German Foreign Office for Latin America and the Caribbean, co-signed the memorandum as honorary witnesses.
Objective: Integration of Honduras into Sparkassenstiftung’s Regional Project for Latin America as one of eight project countries
The integration of Honduras into Sparkassenstiftung’s Regional Project for Latin America, which is financially supported by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) is a precondition for the future project activities in this country and thus the explicit goal of the recently signed Memorandum of Understanding.
With a cooperation agreement between CNBS and Sparkassenstiftung, Georg Fahrenschon, the President of the Deutscher Sparkassen- und Giroverband (German Savings Banks Association), and the Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández paved the ground for future cooperation activities already in Berlin in October 2015.
National strategy for financial inclusion: Sparkassenstiftung supports CNBS in developing the financial market of Honduras
Honduras has 8.6 million inhabitants. Given a moderate economic growth, this Central American country is characterized by an extremely unequal income distribution and high poverty rates. A huge problem is the high safety risk – Honduras belongs to the countries with the highest murder rates in the world.
The Honduran financial market is dominated by a huge difference between formal financial institutions and the partly informal microfinance sector in mainly rural areas. The financial sector has to cope with two big challenges: First, giving broad segments of the population access to financial services and second, improving the population’s level of basic financial literacy.
The Honduran government has realized these challenges and takes the necessary measures to encounter them. In so doing, the Honduran banking supervisory authority CNBS has developed a national strategy for financial inclusion with the aim to give the population access to needs-oriented financial services and ensure its basic financial education. The Sparkassenstiftung will support CNBS in further enhancing and implementing this national strategy.
Please find the press release about the event here:
<link http: www.cnbs.gob.hn files protocolo _blank>CNBS
<link http: www.latribuna.hn alemania-apoyara-educacion-financiera-familias _blank>La Tribuna
<link http: www.laprensa.hn economia _blank>La Prensa
<link file:54>Sparkassenzeitung, 24. März 2016
Contact partners:
Inka Rank / Carina Lau
Sparkassenstiftung für internationale Kooperation
Simrockstraße 4
53113 Bonn
Phone: +49 228 9703 -6631 / -6608
Fax: +49 228 9703 -6613