The World Council of Credit Unions, Inc. said it brought together representatives from NCUA and the Financial Services Commission of Ontario, Canada to educate senior policy makers with the World Bank, Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest (CGAP) and Inter-American Development Bank on the benefits and options for direct supervision of credit unions.
WOCCU said that at the end of 2004 it learned that the World Bank's Financial Sector Policy Unit is in the process of conducting a year-long study on cooperative financial institutions in developing countries and how best to expand access to such institutions by consumers.
"It is expected that a significant result of the study will be the formulation of policy position by the World Bank regarding how they believe cooperative financial institutions should be regulated in development markets," WOCCU said.
"Too often we hear ministries of finance or superintendents of banks indicate that they would like to ensure that credit unions have appropriate supervision but see too many resource constraints in doing so and therefore leave the sector without any prudential oversight," said Dave Grace, World Council of Credit Unions' senior manager of association service.
