Financial inclusion through education and access to financial services – a condition for a prosperous society.

AmCham Romania launches a public invitation for dialogue and collaboration aimed at increasing Romanian’s financial inclusion, a determinant for increasing the quality of life for citizens, for the prosperity of individuals and society as a whole, and an area where Romania continues to have major gaps compared to the EU average.

The measures AmCham recommends have been discussed during a multi-stakeholder roundtable on September 19 that brought together representatives of the financial services sector and of the regulatory authorities in the field.

The AmCham initiative complements the awareness projects and financial education campaigns run by companies in the financial services sectors and aims to emphasize the need for a coordinated implementation of financial inclusion manners on a national level. Such an approach would lead to increasing living standards and quality of life for citizens, while on a macro level would stimulate economic growth.

“While Romania has made significant progress in the recent years as concerns the financial services, our country continues to rank the lowest in the EU in terms of level of financial education and access to some categories of financial goods and services, a situation even more severed by the major gap between the rural and urban areas from this perspective. We trust that this particular AmCham initiative will contribute to an increased commitment of each stakeholder – private and public alike- to reaching the shared objective of prosperity for Romanians, of transferring the economic growth into a better quality of life” stated Ciprian Lăduncă, member of the AmCham Romania Board of Directors and Co-Chair of the AmCham Capital Markets and Financial Services Committee.

In AmCham’s view, increasing the level of financial inclusion nationwide takes a simultaneous approach of both the need for financial education for all age categories and facilitating access to financial products and services including by promoting fiscal and non-fiscal measures.

The recommendations elaborated by experts within the AmCham membership stand as an invitation for long term collaboration addressed to the business community and decision makers, therefore AmCham Romania will continue to promote them and encourage their implementation, in line with the AmCham strategic priorities that purse the overall goal of prosperity for Romania and for Romanians.

The Financial Inclusion paper can be accessed on AmCham Romania’s webpage here.