DepEd, RCBC team up to promote digital savings

March 10, 2021 – Eager to promote financial literacy among young learners, parents, and teachers, the Department of Education (DepEd) partnered with the Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC) for its digital savings campaign.

DepEd’s will work with RCBC for its Ipon Galing initiative, a massive digital financial education awareness campaign that will be done nationwide to further encourage learners, as well as teachers and parents, to save using digital saving platforms. RCBC has recently launched an incentives promotion for those who will begin their savings journey using the DiskarTech, RCBC’s Taglish finance super app.

“As DepEd also integrated financial literacy in our K-12 curriculum, partnership programs like DiskarTech of RCBC will allow our teachers and learners to experience how technology works for us while we are securing our finances and save for the most important and unanticipated events such as the COVID-19 pandemic,” DepEd Undersecretary for Finance Annalyn M. Sevilla shared, representing DepEd Secretary Leonor Magtolis Briones.

“We pledge to put our hearts, minds and energy to make sure this project is an unqualified success. Let us work together to encourage more Filipinos to save especially the young ones,” RCBC President and Chief Executive Officer Eugene S. Acevedo said.

Based on the 2019 Financial Inclusion Survey of the BSP, 53% of adult Filipinos are savers but 51% of them save at home.

“DepEd finds a shared value with the RCBC in our diskarte to not only survive but thrive in this new normal by being agile and innovative. Our partnership hopes to equip our learners, as well as our teachers and parents, nationwide with more skills towards their financial well-being,” DepEd Legislative Affairs, External Partnerships and Project Management Service Undersecretary Tonisito M.C. Umali, Esq. said.

The same survey showed that while account ownership has improved in the last two years, more than two-thirds of Filipinos still lack access to a formal account.

“In this time of pandemic, having a transaction account has proved crucial to social protection and financial resilience,” Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Center for Learning and Inclusion Advocacy Director Ellen Joyce L. Suficiencia said.

Account owners had also been found to have a higher rate of savings, access to digital financial services, and less debt, added Suficiencia.

The event was also graced by financial adviser Salve Duplito, host of ABS-CBN News Channel’s On The Money; Mr. Rey Parale, Vice President For External Affairs of the Confederation of Parents-Teachers Association of Makati, and Teacher Arnold Chan, Business Manager of the Federation of Public School Teachers of Makati.

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