BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – THE Ministry of Finance has mobilized its staff once more to flesh out its mandate of public awareness and education through a public meeting entitled ‘Survival Tips for the Challenging Global and Financial Times’.
The forum is set for next Monday (Aug. 17) at the Cayon Community Centre, and will give the public an opportunity to engage financial experts, retailers and ministry officials in matters relating to healthy financial practices during challenging economic times.
Panelists include representatives from the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, COURTS St. Kitts and Nevis Ltd., the Inland Revenue Department, the St. Kitts Cooperative Credit Union and the St. Kitts-Nevis Development Bank.
Speaking with SKNVibes, Fiscal Division Economist and coordinator of the event Gary Thomas informed that the session would be in a town hall meeting format, and would give the public an opportunity to be gain knowledge that could help them make more informed decisions in a time of economic uncertainty.
The forum, according to Thomas, is expected to be “close and personal” and would address budgeting, saving, investment, wise spending and debt management.
“We believe that it is timely. Initially, when the crisis started biting St. Kitts and the region, we had to first see how we could assist businesses in order for people to keep their jobs.
Now that it is impacting the real economy and affecting people’s jobs, we thought it was an ideal time to have this kind of public education forum organized,” he said.
According to the public sector economist, Monday’s event would be the first in a series of similar educational events organized by the Ministry. He urged everyone to make a special effort to participate in the discussion, as he believes many benefits would be engendered.
“Information would be related in a real and digestible way because the reality of an economic recession is that people will have hard time.
“If people can walk away at the end of the day and have the helpful information that they can take into their own lives, then we would have achieved one of our main objectives,” he continued.
The forum begins at 7:30 p.m. with presentations by the panelists and an open-floor discussion would follow.
