Speaking at a conference titled, “Access to Finance and Access to Information,” Atiur Rahman, Governor of the Bangladesh Bank (BB), stated that the focus of the next biannual update of the monetary policy will be to “ensure that the benefits [of economic growth are spread] to all.”
According to Governor Rahman, despite the expansion of banks into poor, rural communities and the proliferation of microfinance institutions (MFIs), access to financial services remains limited and spotty. Governor Rahman identified asymmetries in information and lack of access to financial services as the primary concerns he wishes to address in the new policy. One solution is the use of “telecentres,” which are public centers that provide rural communities with access to the Internet and other technologies. The primary goal of the telecentres is to spread information about the financial services available to the rural poor from the government, NGOs and MFIs. Additional functions of the telecentre are to facilitate the timely distribution of workers’ remittances in remote areas and to gather credit information for lenders about new clients.
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