Financial Education in Georgia
A financial education course will be introduced into public schools in the Spring of 2020, as part of a civil education program. The Ministry of Education took this decision as part of its partnership with the National Bank of Georgia (NBG).
The decision is to improve the level of financial education in our society as a part of the national education strategy, Lasha Gzirishvili, head of the NBG Department for Consumer Rights Protection and Financial Education told BusinessPartner.
The level of financial education in the country is, unfortunately, low. The first and only research conducted in 2016 has showed that not many citizens plan costs and save money, Gzirishvili noted.
“We do not have a bad situation in terms of knowledge; that is, our citizens understand financial issues, more or less. Their conduct should also be appraised as satisfactory: everybody tries to timely cover their liabilities, even utility taxes. However, we have some problems in attitude. In general, a Georgian is a wasteful person. Our citizens pay very little attention to budget planning; not many of them save money, and get ready for their pension. In general, Georgian citizens rarely plan their future costs or plan for so-called pocket money. Therefore, we have decided to develop a financial education national strategy, and implement it in real life. Many organizations assist us in this respect, including the Ministry of Education”, Gzirishvili said.
To this end, the NBG has already prepared several educational textbooks for children, and assumed responsibility for disseminating financial education. However, record across the world proves that the efforts of central banks alone cannot bring worthwhile results, and many other instances should see engagement with this process, both governmental and nongovernmental, finance, donor and private companies, he added.
Gzirishvili stressed that as part of the National Bank’s financial education national strategy, the perception upgrading measures are being held twice a year since 2012, such as Money Weekly in spring and Global Saving Day in October. The introduction of financial education courses to public schools is the most advanced decision, Gzirishvili noted.
‘The most useful outcome is that, as a result of our cooperation with the Education Ministry, we have agreed and the Education Ministry has already updated the national curricula, under which, in this academic year -namely in Spring- a financial education course will be launched at public schools, as an integrated part of a civil education course. At this stage, we are working on training teachers so they also meet this process prepared”, Gzirishvili noted.
As for the financial education of adult citizens in our society, textbooks for the micro and small business sectors have been prepared, and the project for small farmers is also being developed, the director of the NBG Department for Consumer Rights Protection and Financial Education noted.
“As for other groups, naturally, we plan to implement various projects for adults, too. We have already finished a textbook for micro and small business sectors describing how to take the right financial decisions, and how to communicate with various financial organizations. Moreover, at this stage, we are preparing similar textbooks for micro and small farmers, too, and in the near future, these textbooks will be ready. We will also hold training sessions together with our partners”, Lasha Gzirishvili said.