By KENNEDY MUPESENI –
ZANACO will spend 60 per cent of its K1 million corporate social investment on financial literacy programmes before the end of this year.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) manager Caroline Handia said Zanaco would continue prioritising financial education on its corporate social investment agenda.
“Every year we allocate about K1 million for corporate social responsibility programmes and this year about 60 per cent of the total allocation translating into K600, 000 will be spent on financial education before the end of the year,” Ms Handia said.
She was speaking in an interview in Lusaka recently.
Ms Handia said so far about 50,000 individuals and organisations had been captured across the country even where the bank has no presence.
“We have reached well over 50,000 since the bank embarked on financial literacy trainings across the country and our targets have been small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), schools and Zanaco staff members,” she said.
Ms Handia said imparting financial knowledge in the school going children could go a long way in creating a future cadre of investors.
Ms Handia said the challenge facing the commercial bank was that the need for financial education was so huge.
Recently the Bank of Zambia (BoZ) observed that the revision of the school curriculum to include financial education at all levels will result in the development of SMEs in the country.
