OREANDA-NEWS. September 23, 2011. The National Bank of Moldova together with the MasterCard company is launching the population’s financial literacy raising campaign, particularly, in terms of cashless payment promotion in Moldova. The NBM Vice-President Emma Tabirta said at the news conference Wednesday that being poorly informed of the bankcards’ advantages, Moldovan population uses them mainly to withdraw cash. “If payments via bankcards in the European countries make up 50-80% of the total volume of operations with bankcards, then in Moldova this indicator is about 2%. People take bankcards only as a means to cash money”, says Emma Tabirta.

She said payments via bankcards would enable to reduce the money supply and therefore would reduce inflation, would enhance payments’ transparency, guarantee security of funds placed on the account and others. MasterCard Country Director for Moldova and Romania Cozmin Vladimirescu said a campaign would be carried out to inform population of advantages of bankcards usage.

“About 90% of bankcards in Moldova are currently provided in Moldova within salary projects, all countries of the world went through this. It is time now to use the bankcards as payment instruments in full”, said Cozmin Vladimirescu. Emma Tabirta stressed both payment systems and the NBM, banks, economic agents providing services, shopping networks and consumers are interested in cashless payment development in Moldova.

According to the preliminary estimations, the share of payment operations as a result of the campaign will constitute about 30% of the total volume of operations with bankcards.