KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) Tuesday launched 2nd Access to Finance (A2F) Survey Report-2015 entitled “State of Financial Access and usage in Pakistan” for encouraging all stakeholders (banks) to improve financial inclusion.
Addressing at the launching ceremony of the Survey Report, SBP Governor Ashraf Mahmood Wathra said that the central bank was committed to achieve financial inclusion targets by 2020. He said he would encourage all stakeholders to use the survey data to improve financial inclusion in country as the primary reason was lack of information about banks and bank accounts.
Wathra said that the survey was conducted by the Horus Development Finance and Gallup Pakistan to gauge state of financial access. He said that first survey report was announced in 2008 and today a significant improvement had been witnessed in the financial access. He pointed out that A2F was part of SBP’s strategy and it would serve two objects Access and usage of financial services in Pakistan.
Later, a presentation was given on A2F Survey Report that the survey was carried out in all four provinces based on views of 10,626 men and women. The presentation revealed that financial inclusion had advanced in both urban and rural areas of country and the urban population was still better financially included. The report showed that a small but growing portion of the population was using accounts.
