According to latest data from INSTAT, the Albanian economy posted 0.5% growth in the second quarter, apparently slower compared with growth rates in the first quarter. By sector, economic growth, in this period, was sustained mainly by the positive performance of agriculture and individual branches of industry and services sectors. Valueadded in agriculture was up 3.4%, providing significant contribution by this sector to the overall economic growth during the second quarter. On the other hand, the services sector’s annual value-added was up by 1.8%, slowing down significantly from previous quarters’ rates. Transport and financial intermediation were the main drivers of this sector, whereas most of other branches of the services sector contracted, year on year. Likewise, the industry sector shrank by 8.5% in the second quarter, after its positive performance in the last six quarters. Industry sector deceleration during this quarter was largely influenced by slashed output in “Energy, water and gas”, whereas extraction and processing industry continued their upward value-added. After its surge in the first quarter of 2011, the construction sector contracted again in the second quarter, posting annualised downgrade of 1.7%. As regards aggregate demand, during the first half of the year, economic growth was supported mainly by the public sector and foreign demand contributions, whereas internal demand was lacklustre. Available data suggest that private consumption and investments were sluggish during the first half of the year, thus conditioning the below-potential growth of the economy during this period. Private consumption continues to reflect consumers’ reluctance to spend and their inclination to save.

While assuring the progress of the financial system and well-established infrastructure in Thailand, we also recognize the importance of consumer empowerment in our financial sector. As a consequence, we established the Financial Consumer Protection Center or FCC in 2012 to promote consumer protection. One of the FCC’s key tasks is to improve financial literacy of consumers. Over the past few years, the FCC has continually been delivering financial education within its capacity through creative tools and communication channels. The FCC has been sending messages that would help shape consumers’ behavior towards responsible finance practices, which would consequently lead to financial discipline of the entire nation. Nevertheless, the attempt to improve people’s behavior to save and spend wisely has not yet been fully accomplished. Household debt is still high at 70 to 80 percent of GDP for the past two years. Crucial financial information and knowledge provided at Point-of-sale were often ignored by customers. Moreover, people still seek loans from alternative sources such as from the informal sector where interest rates are incredibly high and debt collection practices are sometimes abusive and unethical. We also have to admit that the demand side evidence is partially influenced by supply side factors. Intense market competition and countless innovative products and services nowadays could also encourage careless spending behavior. Therefore, effective measure to prevent such situation is truly in need. The potential root causes or threats that influence people to make an adverse decision on their saving and spending manner might consist of these three following factors.