The two day KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) Financial Education and Financial Literacy Conference held at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Pietermaritzburg ended on a high note today.
All speakers, including KZN MEC for Economic Development, Mr Mike Mabuyakhulu pointed out that partnerships are crucial to enable people to make informed financial decisions. The KwaZulu-Natal Financial Literacy Association, under the auspices of Finance MEC Ina Cronjé, is a powerful instrument because it is a collective effort.
"This initiative is the way to go if we are serious about building a financial literate and empowered nation," said MEC Mabuyakhulu.
Speaking on the topic of: What makes co-operatives succeed? Lessons learnt from the past, MEC Mabuyakhulu stated that globally co-operatives have proven to have tremendous potential to uplift the lives of people and to develop the economies of the world.
"The province has looked challenges that co-operatives, namely, a lack of skills of the members, access to capital, access to the markets, and ensuring that co-operatives are accessible to all people. We are investing a lot of money in the province in setting up co-operatives. However, it is important for people to be able to sustain their businesses, as we cannot keep giving money", MEC Mabuyakhulu said.
In five breakaway sessions (In school youth, out of school youth, small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs), government employees, and women and vulnerable groups) several issues were fleshed out; including whether financial education in the current school curriculum is sufficient, ways of approaching out of school youth, the need for monitoring and evaluation of financial education programmes, a baseline study on financial literacy levels of government employees, the need for a comprehensive training programme for SMMEs, and how savings groups should become more accessible for disabled people.
Several valuable recommendations to take financial education forward were made in the feedback session. A suggestion was made to have biannual financial education conference In conclusion the Conference Director, Professor Govender, thanked all speakers and delegates for their participation, as well as the following sponsors who made the Conference possible: The KZN Provincial Treasury, ABSA, Capital Media Group, Capitec Bank, Financial Planning Institute, Morar Incorporated, Nedbank, Old Mutual, Postbank, PricewaterhouseCoopers, The Banking Association of South Africa, The Witness and the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
For more information please contact:
Musa Cebisa
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