Membership savings tips EC$2M
BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - GENERAL MANAGER of the FND Enterprise Cooperative Credit Union, James Webbe has announced that his organisation has achieved accelerated growth since its official establishment as a Credit Union 13 months ago.
In an exclusive interview with SKNVibes Business, Webbe said while his organisation had experienced a very difficult 2010 in several areas, it was able to double its target.
“We were not able to get some of the things done that we had slated, because of a number of reasons. However, we were able to exceed our target, as we saw accelerated growth since being established as a Credit Union late in December 2009.”
He pointed out that the qualitative projections have been very good and noted that this year’s Annual General Meeting would be held in the first quarter. He said that membership of his organisation continues to grow steadily and stressed that plans are in place to increase this year's target in an effort to achieve further success.
Webbe explained that there were a number of changes because the organisation had transitioned from a lending institution to a credit union. He declared that over the past 13 months the organisation had accumulated EC$2M in savings and to date has 772 shareholders with a share capital of EC$382,460.
“We are obviously proud with this level of growth, as we intend to aggressively pursue the market this year in an effort to continue on the excellent start that we have gathered thus far,” he said.
He said that this achievement came while the Credit Union was faced with a number of difficulties and challenges, and they intend to implement a control strategy.
“What we now need to do is to concentrate on tightening up in terms of control. What is also important is that this feat was achieved without an aggressive marketing plan,” he added.
The credit union stalwart disclosed that a number of new and innovative marketing initiatives would be implemented this year, and one of the objectives is to ensure the public better understands the importance of credit unionising.
Giving an example of the importance of the cooperative financial institutions, Webbe said that some decades ago it was the credit union that pulled many countries out of the economic challenges they faced, especially those in the Caribbean region.
“I will continue to repeat, times like these affords us an opportunity of being able to come together so that we can survive the tough times. We got to draw from experiences of the past when people came together in various cooperatives, and that is what we would need to do now. This will help us in battling the very challenging global crisis which affects each of us,” Webbe stated.
Webbe issued an appeal to the public to get acquainted with and connected to the Credit Union. He also expressed the need for people to develop cooperative sports among themselves, adding that this is not needed only financially but in every possible area.
“People need to understand that what we are faced with can only be eradicated if we begin to learn to help each other. We also need to pool our resources together as it is only then that we can succeed. We need to really get back to the level where we can come together and do things in a unified and cooperative manner. I call upon neighbours, friends and relatives living together to understand that sharing and coming together are very important so that we can weather the storm,” he opined.
Webbe made reference to the distant past when people shared whatever they had with each other. He said in many cases they shared the same things and it was done out of love.
“Today we have people living in a community and or street and they do not speak to their next door neighbour, they are not speaking with a brother or sister, family not talking to each other, and so that explains why people are no longer sharing with each other,” he added.
The FNDECCU General Manager is of the view that too many selfish acts are being perpetrated by modern society and some people do not even know their next door neighbour.
“People don’t know each other today as things have changed, and that is why we need the credit union so that we can reinvent the cooperative spirit that seems to have been lost,” Webbe concluded.
