đź“· Daily Express
Queen Maxima of the Netherlands on Thursday said that much more work has to be done to advance and broaden financial inclusion in the Philippines.
During a briefing on Thursday at the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) office in Manila, Queen Maxima said financial services should be more available to Filipinos to improve their financial health.
Data from BSP’s financial inclusion survey, 56 percent of adults in the country had a bank account as of 2021, an increase from just 23 percent in 2017. The Central Bank wants to reach the 70 percent target by 2024.
Máxima made her first trip to the Philippines in 2015 while serving as the UN’s special advocate. She visited the Philippines again this year in her capacity as the United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development (UNSGSA).
“I was here in 2015 and financial inclusion back then was 17 percent, probably very low,” Queen Máxima said.
“So my visit actually resulted in a lot of work by the predecessors of [BSP Governor Eli] Remolona [Jr.] and also from government officials to actually change the regulatory environment to make a lot of things possible,” Queen Máxima added.
She said that collaboration between the public and private sectors is necessary to increase connectivity and guarantee that financial services are available to all members of society.
In a courtesy call in Malacañang earlier this week, Queen Maxima also told President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. that she wants to help Filipinos improve their financial health and build resilience to economic and climate shocks.
“Well, that’s a very, very handsome offer. Thank you very much, Your Majesty,” Marcos told UNSGSA Queen Máxima.
Maxima pointed out that safe internet access, cybersecurity, digitization, and interoperable payments in the country are necessary for financial inclusion.
Marcos then mentioned that initiatives to increase internet access in the Philippines are already in progress.
BSP, for its part, said that it is working to build a platform that would broaden access for Filipinos to various insurance and pension services as part of its efforts to increase financial inclusion in the country.
BSP Governor Eli Remolona said the central bank is exploring open finance by creating an application programming interface (API). The API’s initial focus will be on pensions under the personal equity and retirement account (PERA) scheme.
PERA is a voluntary retirement savings plan that augments current retirement benefits from state-run agencies the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), and the Social Security System (SSS).
“What we’re trying to do now is encourage open finance by designing our own platforms, our own APIs, and they will all be about financial health. So we’re starting with PERA for example, pension scheme,” Remolona said.
“We’re gonna create an API for that and ask all the banks, all agreed to do this, connect to PERA so that account holders in the bank can do their pensions through PERA,” Remolona added.
Remolona mentioned the “expensive” prices in the Philippines and stated that in addition to PERA, the BSP is also considering APIs for insurance products like life, property, and accident insurance. (TCSP)
