It’s World Savings Day, and Zamtel urges early intro of saving habits to children

Zamtel says children should be introduced to a culture of saving money in order to create a financially literate Zambia. In commemoration of this year’s World Savings Day today, Zamtel Head of Corporate Affairs and Government Relations, Reuben Kamanga, said children should be oriented on the benefits of saving money at an early stage.

This year’s global commemoration of World Savings Day is being held under the theme ‘Be Money Smart: Savings Give Life a Lift!’

Mr Kamanga said Zamtel is proud to be actively playing a role in the promotion of financial inclusion through the use of digital channels such as Zamtel Kwacha and ZamPay.

He said saving money for the future is important as it acts as a buffer against some of life’s eventualities.

Mr Kamanga said Zamtel, as a prime driver of digital transformation has developed innovative platforms and channels that make it easier for people to save a portion of their incomes using their mobiles devices.

“We realise that a well-entrenched savings culture will go a long way in deepening our financial sector in line with the National Financial Inclusion Strategy which targets to increase financial inclusion from 59% to 80% by 2022. Using Zamtel Kwacha, our customers can save up to K10,000 for individual accounts and K250,000 for Small to Medium company accounts with ease from within the comfort of their homes or offices,” Mr Kamanga said.

He added, “Since Zamtel Kwacha is easy to use, we are encouraging parents and guardians to open savings accounts for their children and jointly manage them in order to inculcate a savings culture in children.”

Mr. Kamanga said using Zamtel Kwacha, the company is moving into a new era of mobile savings and loan products using Patumba, which is a partnership with Hobbiton. He said the partnership enables any active Zamtel mobile money customer to earn attractive interest on any deposits into the Hobbiton Savings and Credit account.

“This is another partnership that provides an end to end social security platform consisting of investments, savings and credit towards education or retirement plans. We are committed to an inclusive agenda in the financial sector as we strive to make Zambia a cashless society,” Mr. Kamanga said.

He said Zamtel is encouraging savings while improving access to microcredit for the unserved and underserved population, thus bridging the savings and credit provision gap in Zambia

Source: Zamtel