Madang Province is the first province in the Momase Region to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Centre for Excellence in Financial Inclusion (CEFI) to introduce financial Inclusion activities in the province. This also makes Madang Province the sixth province to sign a MoU with CEFI, following Milne Bay, West New Britain, Western Highlands, East New Britain and New Ireland provinces. Present to sign the MoU recently was the Governor for Madang Province Mr. Ramsey Pariwa, MP, Assistant Governor, Financial System Stability Group (FSSG), Bank of Papua New Guinea (BPNG) and Alternate Chair CEFI Board, Mr. George Awap and CEFI Executive Director Mr. Saliya Ranasinghe. Also present to witness the signing ceremony were CEFI Board Members including, CEFI Deputy Executive Director Mr. Peter Samuel, Ms. Susil Nelson Kongoi and Mr. Sanja Pepae. The objective of the MoU is to forge a partnership in rolling out financial inclusion activities and programs align with the targets set out in the National Financial Inclusion Strategy 2023-207. This is also to advocate and create awareness of financial literature and education to empower individuals to alleviate themselves from poverty. The Madang Governor Hon. Mr. Ramsey Pariwa thanked BPNG, CEFI, USAID and other development partners for their collaboration thus he is now working with his administration to put in place a plan for financial inclusion for the province. “The national government in its Medium-Term Development Plan IV (MTDP IV) is looking at growing the economy base, through its intervention program on banking and finance and financial inclusion, further the Madang Provincial Integrated Development Plan was aligned to the MTDP IV.” “We have captured banking and finance in our provincial plan, that's an indication that we are serious in looking at banking and finance and SMES in the province.” The Assistant Governor, FSSG, BPNG and Alternate Chair CEFI Board, Mr. George Awap also emphasized the importance of financial education stressing the need for Papua New Guineans to know how to manage their finances. “If a population is literate financially, it's about empowering the people to do their business in the most efficient and cost-effective manner.” said Mr. Aawap. “Because if small businesses incur losses, they will give up hope in business because they have no financial knowledge and the ability to manage their own finances.” Meanwhile, CEFI Executive Director Mr. Saliya Ranasinghe further highlighted to the importance of financial inclusion to Governor Pariwa and members of the Madang Provincial Government (MPG) that CEFI was pleased to sign the MoU with MPG to address the issue of financial inclusion. “A larger percentage of people in this country are not involved in banking activities. Even though the banks have increased their outreach, a lot of people still do not enjoy the benefits of the banking sector.” “Our main aim is to bring these people into the financial mainstream, so that they can get benefits out of the banks, and we are proud to say that we now have about 4.2 million bank accounts in the country and 38% of those bank accounts are owned by women.”