GIFS appeal to encourage financial literacy gathers momentum at industry showcase

One of the main goals of our thought leadership initiatives this year is to improve literacy. We’re doing it in the workspace by driving financial literacy across industry and we’re assisting communities by encouraging stakeholders to consider the provision of books as part of their corporate social investment projects. And at the recent African Insurance Exchange (AIE), we received a massive morale boost from former Deputy President Dr Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka.

She’s the current Chairperson of the 2030 Reading Panel. Her mission is to get South Africa’s children to be able to read for meaning within the next seven years. She’s doing it by convening education and society leaders to support and monitor government’s reading initiatives. The panel was spurred into action on the back of the saddening, and damning, Progress in International Reading Literacy Study that showed how far behind South Africa’s young children are, compared to their global counterparts when it comes to reading for meaning.

Mlambo-Ngcuka has reached out to the insurance industry to get aboard the literacy drive which aims to turn around the report’s alarming statistics concerning local children, including that only 19% of South African Grade 4 children could read for meaning in any language in 2021. In an interview with GIFS at the AIE, she said there needs to be a structured and comprehensive plan to increase literacy rates.

GIFS CEO Dr Kershen Pillay agrees that the literacy challenge is one for society as a whole. Responding to Mlambo-Ngcuka’s appeal, Pillay outlined industry support,

“ GIFS will serve as a conduit to ensure that we get South African children reading again.”

IISA CEO Ms Thokozile Mahlangu says financial services as a sector will be assisting itself by improving literacy, in communities and in the workplace, as South Africa as a whole will benefit. IISA delivers the AIE as an annual event for hundreds of delegates to consider the future of the insurance industry while networking and exchanging ideas on best practice.

Pillay’s hopeful 2024’s gathering will be able to show progress, “By 2030, it’s our mission to get our children reading and that’s a basic human right. Hopefully at next year’s AIE, we’ll have positive stats to report on.”

Watch the interviews here:

04 August 2023