News

The Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo launches the Financial Education Program

The Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo in cooperation with Child and Youth Finance International (CYFI), the European Fund for Southeast Europe (EFSE) and the Kosovo Banking Association (KBA), held today the third meeting of the Regional Working Group on Youth Financial Education and Financial Inclusion for Southeast Europe. During the meeting were presented developments in the field of financial education, financial inclusion and consumer protection from all participating countries such as Turkey, Croatia, Slovenia, Romania, Macedonia, Albania and Montenegro.
Today’s event was opened by Mrs. Shkëndije Himaj, Coordinator for General Functions of the Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo, in which occasion she talked about the critical importance of financial education. “One of the CBK strategic goals is to promote a development of the sound financial system in the Republic of Kosovo and further development of the financial education function, in order to create a sound financial culture that helps all parties of the interest to make the right decisions on the basis of sufficient knowledge. These knowledge can only be gained through adequate financial education, which results in the transformation of acquired financial knowledge into financial behaviors.
This would be the optimal reality that all we that are present today aspire. “She further disclosed the three main dimensions in the financial education function: financial stability, consumer protection and financial inclusion. These three dimensions demonstrate the critical role of financial education because everything begins and ends with financial education. Mrs. Himaj then stressed out the need to increase attention to the dimension of a technological accelerated development in particular the virtual world for providing financial products and services. Further on, she launched the Financial Education Program that the CBK has institutionalized with the support of EFSE in order to address the above-mentioned challenges.  Speech of Mrs. Shkëndije Himaj – Coordinator for General Functions of the Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo.

Mrs. Venera Hoxha from the European Fund for SouthEast Europe said that the financial education was not developed alongside the recent developments in the banking sector. “Financial education has not been developed along with the development of the banking sector. The initiatives that have been made by the Central Bank of Kosovo, the Banking Association, should not be ignored. We think that an educated financial client is able to make prudent and appropriate decisions to increase the well-being and the impact on economic development. ”
Then, Besnik Kada, Director of the Department of External Relations at the CBK, explained the initiatives that were undertaken in the past about financial education and what are the objectives in the future. Financial education as an objective of the Central Bank of Kosovo is to promote and maintain a stable financial system. Meanwhile, Mr. Petrit Balija, Director of the Kosovo Banking Association said: “We have started from the scratch, with very little experience but we managed to do much in the short time; the CBK has taken a central role and other stakeholders are very supportive, therefore I would like to thank the CBK for organization of this event, the EFSE for the support and of course commercial banks.”
Then, expressing appreciation to the Central Bank of Kosovo for organizing the event, Ms. Karina Avatkan, representative from CYFI, welcomed the participants and then elaborated on the financial education developments and the opportunities to raise awareness about this field. The Regional Working Group serves as an opportunity for sharing best practices, exchanging experiences, identifying technical assistance opportunities to support the development and implementation of action plans in the field of financial education, financial inclusion and consumer protection. By June 2017, more than 24 governmental institutions from 10 countries in the region are members of the Working Group.