Azerbaijan preparing plan to improve financial literacy of population

By  Trend

The government of Azerbaijan is preparing a comprehensive action plan to improve financial literacy in the country, a source in the government told Trend June 12.

The source said, a working group was established for this purpose, which included representatives of the Central Bank, the Ministries of Education, Economy and Taxes, the Financial Markets Supervision Chamber and the Azerbaijan Banking Training Center.

At the same time, the source added, international experts are involved in the project.

The source told Trend that, within the framework of the action plan it is planned to study the compliance of the current educational programs in Azerbaijani universities with the realities of the financial markets. In addition, members of the working group will take measures to strengthen the training of personnel of banks, and insurance and investment companies.

"Improving the financial literacy of the people is very important in terms of development and empowerment of the financial sector. For example, due to the lack of awareness, many still avoid buying bonds or life insurance policies, which can easily compete with bank deposits in terms of profitability," the source told Trend.

The source believes that, a higher level of financial literacy would allow for avoiding a number of problems.

"Such seemingly little things like the ability to properly form a family budget, correct assessment of one’s own creditworthiness, and to understand what financial instruments may be needed in certain cases would help to avoid excessive debt, unnecessary spending and generally to contribute to the accumulation of funds", the source said.