MANILA, Philippines - The Metropolitan Bank & Trust Company, through its corporate social responsibility arm, the Metrobank Foundation Inc., was awarded the Financial Inclusion Award by The Banker, the world’s premier banking and finance resource monthly magazine based in the United Kingdom and read in over 180 countries, during the 2013 Bank of the Year Awards held last Nov. 28 at the Intercontinental Park Lane Hotel in London.
The Financial Inclusion Award given by an international financial affairs publication owned by The Financial Times Ltd. pays tribute to the cream of the crop of global banking.
As the lone global Financial Inclusion awardee, Metrobank was distinguished for its support to the Back-to-Back Financial Education and Microfinance for overseas Filipino workers (OFW) in Singapore and their families in the Philippines.
In partnership with Alalay sa Kaunlaran Inc. (ASKI) Philippines, one of the country’s largest microfinance institutions and its subsidiary, ASKI Global Ltd., the program provides training on financial education and basic entrepreneurship to OFWs in Singapore and their respective family members in the Philippines to help create financial stability.
“We are honored to be this year’s recipient of The Banker’s Financial Inclusion Award. Beyond the prestige, for us, it is an affirmation of the work that we are doing for the low-income OFW sector and their families. Receiving this award extends to the future of the children of these OFWs because it brings opportunity of income sustainability through the microfinance funds made available for the establishment or expansion of micro enterprises,†said Metrobank Foundation president Aniceto Sobrepeña.
“It gives added hope that the OFWs and their families would have to help each other improve their lives together in their own homes, without having the OFW family member leave the country to earn a living. The award will keep inspiring the economic growth in the localities of these OFW families, because as businesses are established, doors of employment are opened,†Sobrepeña said.
“The prestigious award did not just recognize Metrobank and the Metrobank Foundation, but the hundreds of thousands of Filipino workers in Singapore, and the millions of them in world, and their families back home,†he added.
During Metrobank’s 50th anniversary celebration last year, the bank heightened its support to the OFW program of ASKI by extending a P12-million grant to the program from a previous grant worth P250,000 in 2011.
Dubbed as the MetroGold Financial Education Program and for Migrant Workers and MetroGold for Migrant Workers, an amount of P2 million and P10 million were allocated for these two programs, respectively. Before graduates will be able to avail themselves of a loan, they have to present business cases of the kind of enterprise that they intend to establish.
As a result of the support in 2011, 90 percent have increased their monthly savings by at least 10 percent. All students have submitted business plans that will enable them to establish business in the Philippines using the remittances or through applying for a microfinance loan.
So far, for the MetroGold microfinance program, over P4 million worth of loan applications have been processed. Most business loans are for farming, small-scale groceries and restaurants, and Internet cafés.
In Singapore, a total of 322 MetroGold OFW scholars have graduated upon completion of the Financial Education and Basic Entrepreneurship courses, with an addition of new modules on Personality Development.
Philippine Ambassador to Singapore Minda Cruz graced the graduation last Dec. 1 as guest of honor. Special awards were also given to outstanding graduates such as the Outstanding Basic Entrepreneurship Award, Outstanding Financial Student Award in Savings and Investment categories, and the Leadership Award.
In the Philippines, some 150 family members were trained in financial education in Iloilo and Pangasinan as well as in the National Capital Region.
The Banker’s Financial Inclusion Award was received by Metrobank region head for Europe Walter Lim from The Banker editor Brian Caplen and BBC journalist Michael Duncan Buerk.
To date, The Banker’s Financial Inclusion Award is the third international award won for Metrobank by the Metrobank Foundation. Metrobank bagged the Asian Banking Award for Social Responsibility by the Asian Bankers Association and the Association of Development Financing Institutions in Asia and the Pacific, and the Best Corporate Social Responsibility Program by the Asian Banking and Finance Magazine in 1999 and 2007, respectively.