Savings are the population cash income that are deferred in order to accumulate a certain amount to meet their needs in the future.
PURPOSE OF POPULATION SAVINGS
- unforeseen circumstances cases
- Making large purchases (as well as start-up capital for the real estate and cars acquisition)
- Payment for various celebrations, relaxation, treatment
- Child Birth, payment for children’s education, weddings, other expenses associated with children
- Retaining a decent standard of living in retirement
POPULATION SAVINGS BEHAVIOR IN TAJIKISTAN
- 40% of 1.1 million households make savings
- 47% of the population lives below the poverty line, so they don’t make savings
- The population mainly keeps savings at home or invests in goods and livestock
- The savings main purpose is unforeseen circumstances and savings for long-term goals such as: family celebrations, child education, major acquisitions
- 11% of them (less than 5% of all households) trust their savings to financial institutions.
- Only a small percentage of the number of households in Tajikistan trust their savings to commercial banks or MDOs.
- The reasons for the limited use of financial services in Tajikistan are:
- Low financial literacy and population savings culture of the Republic of Tatarstan
- Incompletely restored population confidence of the Republic of Tajikistan as a result of the USSR collapse, unstable economic and political situation (devaluation, denomination, inflation)
- Looting During Hostilities
- Insufficient information on the financial market, its products and the investors/depositor rights protection at the level of the Law of the Republic of Tajikistan
- Financial institutions do not actively attract customers
- Lack of financial services in hard-to-reach, sparsely populated areas
FINANCIAL LITERACY IMPROVEMENT AND PROMOTION OF SAVINGS CULTURE
EXPERIENCE OF TAJIKISTAN
Project on Financial literacy
- Designed and tested in 2004 – 2005 in Poland
- Contains materials for trainers on conducting seminars on financial literacy
- The training module is adapted to the conditions of countries with transitional economies, available in 10 languages (including Tajik)
- TOT was carried out on the “Plan your future” – training module for 23 trainers from 11 organizations
- Trainers conducted trainings and consultations – for 4 months 362 participants of trainings and 165 participants of consultations
- Successfully applied by participating organizations until now