With the exhibition “Development Money”, the German savings bank Kreissparkasse Esslingen-Nürtingen and the Sparkassenstiftung für internationale Kooperation (Savings Banks Foundation for International Cooperation) present an art photo documentation with unique impressions from Ghana, Laos and Vietnam. Heinrich Haasis, President of the World Savings Banks Institute, and Franz Scholz, Chairman of the Board of Kreissparkasse Esslingen-Nürtingen, inaugurated the exhibition at the “Kreissparkassenhaus” (Savings Banks House) in Esslingen on 30 October 2014 together with the savings bank’s board members, Burkhard Wittmacher and Frank Dierolf, as well as the Head of the District Authority, Heinz Einiger.
For everyone and every nation: Saving money helps to overcome a crisis
In his opening speech, Haasis, Sparkassenstiftung’s Chairman of the Board, informed the some 150 invited guests about the current trends and developments of the international financial sector. At the same time he commemorated the 90th anniversary of the World Savings Day and talked about the activities undertaken by Sparkassenstiftung to introduce this special day worldwide.
The importance of saving, even in difficult times, was one of the core topics of his speech. Higher investments and spending should not and cannot be the answer to the currently comparatively low economic growth in German and Europe – a presently much discussed issue. With restraint Haasis considers such kind of approaches to boost the economy, as they were also proposed by a worried international financial elite during the annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington in mid-October. In the past, debt-financed investment programmes often turned out to be a flash in the pan. The creation of financial reserves not only helps private persons to provide for difficult times, but also companies and corporate groups. According to Haasis, Germany’s policy of saving will be to the country’s benefit and show Germany the way out of stagnation.
Haasis also mentioned the results of the stress test of the European Central Bank (ECB) and particularly referred to the problems the banks in Southern Europe have to face. In these countries, the banks do not only have to cope with some old burdens in their balance sheets, but also with an unbroken economic crisis and problems arising in the private banking business due to the high level of unemployment.
The declining willingness of some eurozone countries to implement reforms, the increasing pressure on the policy-makers to adopt populist measures, and the willingness of the ECB to take even unconventional steps to stabilise the economy –all these actions do not help to improve the trust in the stability of the finance and banking system, according to Haasis. In view of the imbalance of the regulatory mechanisms within the eurozone, where huge shadow banks are further permitted to operate without interference, but small (savings) banks are regulated that strongly that it is almost impossible for them to operate customer-friendly, Haasis’s outlook on the near future is rather gloomy.
Sparkassenstiftung’s activities: Commitment to people who are worse off
“The perception we Germans have that saving is a positive thing is unfortunately not widely spread around the globe. There is an enormous potential to mobilise savings in developing and emerging countries”, Haasis further explained. “And yet, the creation of savings as private provision for the daily risks and needs is even more important in those countries, where there are no social safety mechanisms.” That is why the World Savings Day is not only an efficient tool for financial education of the population in Germany, but also in developing and emerging countries. A presentation showing pictures of events in Sparkassenstiftung’s partner countries, where the World Savings Day has been successfully introduced, was commented by Haasis with the following words: “Since 2011, the Sparkassenstiftung is systematically and with large success conveying this tradition to its project countries within the scope of the project approach “Financial Literacy and Savings Mobilisation”.
In more than ten project countries, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, the Ukraine, Rwanda and Mexico, Sparkassenstiftung has by now introduced the World Savings Day according to the German example. A rising number of foreign financial institutions are interested in introducing and organising World Savings Days on their own.
Since 1992, Sparkassenstiftung has conveyed the success factors of the German Sparkassen (savings banks) to developing and emerging countries and has thus supported local banks, which are sustainably promoting the economic and social development in their respective countries. In particular small and medium-sized enterprises (SME), but also poor people and social fringe groups are among the partner institutions’ target groups. Currently, Sparkassenstiftung is implementing 34 projects in 31 countries with an annual project volume of about 13 million euros.
The business model operated by the German Sparkassen (savings banks) is experiencing a revival – despite or even because of the global financial crises, Mr. Haasis stated with reference to the increasing number of requests for project support the Sparkassenstiftung has also received from European countries. “Not only the developing and emerging countries are interested in our German savings banks model, but the European countries have expressed their interest, too. On the request of the Deutscher Sparkassen- und Giroverband (German Savings Banks Association – DSGV) we have meanwhile developed concepts for decentralised and networking financial institutions in Greece, Ireland and Estonia.”
Sparkassenstiftung’s work illustrated in pictures
The photo exhibition presented at the Kreissparkasse Esslingen shows a selection of photographs, illustrating the everyday life of the people in Ghana, Laos and Vietnam. The photographer Philip Ruopp visited these three project countries of Sparkassenstiftung for a couple of weeks and collected intense impressions of the cultural, religious and political circumstances on site. The artful pictures display the lives of the recipients of “development money”, while catching the money influx in an undisguised form.
Until 28 November 2014, the photo exhibition can be visited at the customer hall of Kreissparkasse Esslingen-Nürtingen in Esslingen, Bahnhofstraße 8. As a follow-up to the exhibition, all visitors get a free copy of the exhibition catalogue displaying further pictures taken by the photographer Philip Ruopp.
For any further information concerning the project activities of Sparkassenstiftung für internationale Kooperation (Savings Banks Foundation for International Cooperation), please, access the <link http: www.sparkassenstiftung.de en home.html _blank>link
<link file:135 _blank>Sparkassenzeitung Online, 12.November 2014
<link file:533 _blank>Kreissparkasse Esslingen-Nürtingen
<link file:535 _blank>Firmenpresse.de
<link file:536 _blank>OpenPR
<link file:537 _blank>Eßlinger Zeitung
For any further inquiries, please, contact:
Carina Lau, Public Relations Department
Sparkassenstiftung für internationale Kooperation
Phone: +49 228 9703-608
Email: <link>carina.lau@sparkassenstiftung.de
Ulrich Unger, Head of Department Corporate Communications
Kreissparkasse Esslingen-Nürtingen
Phone: +49 711 398-44240
Email: <link>ulrich.unger@ksk-es.de