Spending records and saving awareness can help grow country's economy.

• Author: Ahmed, Khalil

Byline: Khalil Ahmed

PAGE: Tell me something about yourself, please

Hamad Rasool Bhullar: I am currently working in a large public sector organization. With respect to the financial sector, I have been involved in research and training for over 27 years and so far conducted over 300 trainings on different aspects of finance, business ethics, audit and corporate governance from basic concepts to professional applications in Projects Finance, Shariah compliant risk management, investment management and corporate governance etc.

PAGE: What are your views on the saving culture in Pakistan?

Hamad Rasool Bhullar: As a matter of fact, our nation is not trained for such culture causing huge wastage in general. Sometimes I feel we need to work not only for financial savings but also on many aspects of other sectors of savings, which is only possible with quality education and learning. A huge amount of wastage is not only occurring in the form of food and vegetables sectors but it is also causing opportunity cost to the nation.

Financial saving culture can bring a huge impact on the GDP of our society, only if we compare it with our regional countries like India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. We are lagging far behind which is also one of the causes of losing international competitiveness. The problem is that, a major part of our economy is undocumented. We have the dilemma that we are even not able to collect the right data on savings and investments.

PAGE: What must the government do to enhance the saving to GDP ratio?

Hamad Rasool Bhullar: There are lots of actions and programs, which should be started and possible only if the documentation of economy is ensured. A low level of education is the major cause. Further, we need to add certain topics like economics and finance as compulsory courses, in the school education which would motivate savings.

PAGE: How could the financial institutions play a vital role for personal finance and the saving culture at the same time?

Hamad Rasool Bhullar: Financial institutions can play an important role for the development of savings and personal finance culture. Again the undocumented nature of economy leads to certain hidden transactions and non-disclosure of information, which causes...