is a financial literacy session for microfinance clients and beneficiaries of the government ’ s conditional cash transfer ( cct ) program, many of whom are unbanked. the sessions are designed to enhance their capacity to manage resources and make wise financial decisions that would eventually benefit their household, their community, and eventually the larger economy. these sessions are conducted in partnership with our department of social welfare and development, the lead administrator of our cct program. indeed, we continue to view multi - stakeholder partnership as an important strategy to facilitate the expansion and deepening of our financial system. moving forward, we see the value of collecting evidence and data that conclusively affirms what we believe to be true : • that access to financial services empowers households to better manage their resources and improve the quality of their lives ; and • that broad - based access to finance and financial inclusion support financial stability and facilitate inclusive growth. aside from anecdotal evidence, it would be ideal to have metrics that will give us solid data on how we are doing and how we can make things even better. to implement this commitment, we will engage various institutions in further consultations... to develop a national financial inclusion strategy. with a unified vision, synergy of action and complementarity of initiatives, we should make financial inclusion a reality across our country. our ultimate goal is to provide every filipino the opportunity to benefit from having access to appropriate financial services. ladies and gentlemen. we are here because we share the same vision : to fight poverty and improve lives across the world. let us therefore leverage on each others ’ competencies and expertise by forging effective partnerships, and moving in unison toward our common goal of poverty reduction, financial inclusion and inclusive growth. together, we can cover a lot of ground. once again, i welcome all of you to the philippines for the 2013 microcredit summit on partnerships against poverty. thank you! and as we say in the philippines : mabuhay! bis central bankers ’ speeches

amando m tetangco, jr : partnerships against poverty speech by mr amando m tetangco, jr, governor of bangko sentral ng pilipinas ( bsp, the central bank of the philippines ), at the 2013 microcredit summit “ partnerships against poverty “, manila, 9 october 2013. * * * good morning! the philippines is pleased to welcome all of you to the 2013 microcredit summit : partnerships against poverty. that the summit is being held in this part of the world at this time is deeply appreciated. according to the asian development bank, two - thirds of the world ’ s poor are in asia and the pacific. indeed, while economic growth has improved lives by the millions, many still live in poverty. clearly, there is a need for intervention to accelerate the process of bringing down the benefits of growth to the grassroots. organized broad - based programs... such as this summit address this need. this is where stakeholders across the world can learn from each other and benchmark with international best practices. empowering people to get out of poverty by giving them access to microcredit from formal financial service providers is a winning strategy. how to reach out to the teeming millions who live in poverty is the challenge before us. this is where partnerships against poverty come in. we are fortunate therefore that we have hundreds of participants here at the summit who will share what they have learned : in challenging times as well as in good times. in particular, we are honored that we have with us leading champions and enablers of microfinance, led by : nobel laureate professor muhammad yunus ; minister syarief hasan of indonesia, ambassador jorge domecq fernandez of spain, director larry reed of the microcredit summit campaign ; chair of the microfinance council of the philippines mila mercado - bunker ; and no less than philippine budget secretary florencio abad. here in the philippines, the bangko sentral ng pilipinas, which is the central bank of the philippines, plays a key role in the development of the microfinance sector. as a central bank, our principal mandate is to ensure the stability of prices and the banking sector. in this connection, one of our principal thrusts is to develop a financial system that is inclusive and reaches out to the unbanked. to us, an inclusive financial system makes for a more stable financial system ; equally important, it enables us to help improve the lives of