Dear Editor,
Imagine for a moment that you did not have a bank account. No debit or credit card, no access to an ATM. No cheques, no loans, no savings account. In other words, no access to cheap, reliable, safe and convenient means of saving, borrowing, sending, and spending money.
This situation, which may seem truly frightening to you and me, is a daily reality for many residents in Kwakwani, Berbice River
I see a very real need for continuation of the traditional community banking model in Kwakwani for many years. This sub region is without a banking institution. Which has brought on hardship on many residents.
Access to financial services in Kwakwani and the Berbice River could be described as patchy, with considerable disparities between urban and rural areas since the closest commercial banks or microfinance institutions operate in Linden, Region 10 outside of urban centres. 25 per cent or more of the Kwakwani residents remain completely outside of the financial system. This is particularly pronounced in rural areas. As a consequence, many families and individuals have no chance to deposit savings securely, to take out a loan when necessary or desirable, or to transact payments.
When one considers that a person spends $10,000 just to go to Linden and complete a bank transaction.
Indeed, I believe there is a real place for the customisation and flexibility that community banks can exercise to meet the needs of local communities and small business customers. And while I don’t know exactly what the future of Kwakwani community banking will look like, I am confident that the flexibility and creativity of community bankers will allow them to adapt their business model to prevailing financial and economic trends and conditions. Certainly, community banks have a critical role in keeping their local economies vibrant and growing by lending to creditworthy borrowers in the Berbice River area… Such lending helps foster growth in the economy by allowing businesses to buy new equipment, add workers, or sign contracts for increased trade or services.
Something we should all recognise when people have to go out of the community to do their banking, they’re going to do other services out there also – all you’re going to have left in Kwakwani is a bedroom community. We’re close to that now, and we want to go the other way.
When a bank branch closes, the decline in business lending and competition for customers can have a significant impact on a small town. It means less money is available to start or expand businesses and pay workers who will spend at least some of that money locally. And it creates a cycle: more unemployed people, and more people with limited incomes make other businesses uninterested in the town.
As we all recover from the COVID-19 recession, can regional banks like Republic Bank and Citizens Bank regain their relevance in Kwakwani? Or will the resident increasingly ask: why are we without a bank? We need a bank to finance the way forward in Kwakwani.
I believe that the future of banks depends on their ability to adopt and scale up innovations from non-banking contexts, and transform their parochial culture and mindset in the process. Only then will these banks ensure that the frightening scenario outlined at the beginning of this letter never materialises in other sub regions like Kwakwani (for their own sake!).
Sincerely,
David Adams
