the downside and a major concern is that of inflation. inflationary pressures in the economy are being driven predominantly by external sources mainly food and fuel prices. inflation in june 2011 was 7. 3 %, up from 1. 3 % in november 2010. the good news is that there are indications that the drivers of inflationary pressures in the country are easing. for example, fuel prices at the pump stations have declined, and further reduction is expected in the months ahead. the macro picture ladies and gentlemen, is that our economy is expected to record strong growth again this year. in fact, solomon islands is one of the few high growing economies in the region. i hope this will be an encouragement for all of us to continue to work hard for the betterment of our country. bis central bankers ’ speeches moneypacific goals ladies and gentlemen, i want to say a few words about financial literacy and the moneypacific goals. many of you may not be familiar with the moneypacific goals. these goals have been endorsed by the ministers of finance and ministers of education of pacific islands forum countries. the governors of the central banks in the region including rbnz and rba have also given their approval to these goals. the aim is to achieve these goals by 2020. the four moneypacific goals are : all school children to receive financial education through core curricula. all adults to have access to financial education. simple and transparent consumer protection to be in place. to halve the number of households without access to basic financial services. these four goals can be reduced to three : ( 1 ) financial education, ( 2 ) consumer protection and ( 3 ) access to basic financial services. let me just elaborate further on these goals and briefly report on the activities of the national financial inclusion taskforce established early this year to address these issues. financial education we all agree that a financially literate and informed person usually makes sound financial decisions. the same applies to a financially literate and informed population. so financial education is critical in any country because a lot of the decisions we ( as individuals or as a country ) make everyday involves finances. and better still, if financial education is introduced in our national education curriculum and taught in our primary and secondary schools. in this regard i am pleased to inform the public that work has started to introduce financial education into our primary and secondary schools. hopefully, in the not too distant future, we will produce a generation of solomon islanders that are financially literate and equipped with

curriculum has started. we will hear more about the progress made by the ministry of education and human resources development on achieving this goal when our key - note speaker delivers his address later this morning. let me share with you the outcome of the financial education we facilitated through our primary school adoption program with our three commercial banks and the six primary schools to teach financial education in their schools with a set of lesson outlines supplied by the child and youth international group. the outcome has been very positive. teachers, who taught financial education to their students, reported that the learning objectives in the lessons taught not only impacted the attitudes of their students but on them as teachers as well. they also observed a marked change in their children ’ s habits of spending their allowances. they note children see the value of savings, and have allocated bis central bankers ’ speeches their allowances towards their own bank saving accounts with a commercial bank, rather than spending them all. something else too is happening. a parent who attended the feedback session reported that the children also returned home and taught their parents about savings and other topics learnt from their classes. the parent noticed changes in children ’ s attitude towards money. further the adopted school teachers reported that member of classes in their schools extended their acquired knowledge on goal setting and savings towards a common goal. they all contribute an agreed sum of money towards a common ‘ piggy bank ’ or ‘ monkey ’ money boxes each week towards an amount for their end year school function. indeed, the idea to save little over time has caught on to these children and i encourage parents to support their children to achieve their saving goals. today the children from these adopted primary schools will, demonstrate on stage in their respective stalls what they have learnt in dramas and songs about financial education. these positive outcomes from the teachers and students in applying what they have learnt over the past six weeks encourage us to complete the mapping of the financial education learning objectives in the school curriculum. this indicates that if we can start teaching financial education in our schools, we could have a new generation of economic citizens that are better informed about financial matters than we are today. before i end my opening remarks, let me get back to this four - word theme “ take part. save smart! ” let me say that this theme is not all about money. it also encourages and empowers our children and youth to manage other resources as well. we make decisions on the use of resources each and every day of our lives. therefore, we need to start em