The European funded ABACO project aims to perform a strategy to face the problem of lack of financial education for vulnerable adults and migrants in South Europe.

SITUATION:
Estimates show that at least 20 million people are over-indebted in Europe. According to EU SILC and the GINI Index Portugal, Italy, Spain and Greece have special problems dealing with arrears in the household and none of them have yet developed significant strategies and tools for the prevention of over-indebtedness.
Eurobarometer findings indicate that people most at risk of over-indebtedness are also the more vulnerable, connecting directly with social vulnerability: people with the lowest income, health status, ethnicity, low schooling

OBJECTIVES:
The project strives to adapt methodologies and contents developed by the association NIBUD, an independent Dutch foundation that gives information about household finance, in order to make them usable by partner organisations in their national contexts (Italy, Spain Portugal and Greece). NIBUD´S experience has not been ever translated or implemented in other countries and has a large impact already in the Netherlands. Their websites are consulted every day by more or less 10.000 people aproximately.

OUTPUTS:
Specifically, the partnership will adapt the following tools already developed by NIBUD:

• A basic book concerning budgeting for micro entrepreneurs, with tips about starting a micro-business, getting loans, planning income and expenditure.
• A basic book about budgeting for the household, with tips and warning about most common financial tools for individuals.
• Teacher's guides for both targets (small entrepreneurs and families) which will support teachers in formal and informal trainings of vulnerable groups.
• An "agenda": a gadget with tips and tools to manage the household budget.

The publications will be available in English, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Greek

TARGET USERS:
Target of the project is vulnerable people. The project will have a direct impact on their lives since it will help them to make better financial provision for unforeseen situations, invest wisely, and avoid the pitfalls of payment fraud. People who understand financial issues are also more inclined to heed regulatory risk warnings and less likely to purchase products they do not need, tied into products that they do not understand, or take risks that could drive them into financial difficulty.

• Migrants become more aware of the context they live in and are encouraged to entertain social and economic relations.
• The project supports entrepreneurship directly, by strengthening specific financial skills for small entrepreneurs (building assets, setting goals, overcoming financial obstacles, budgeting etc).
• Unemployed: Financial literacy is also connected with employability since it involves life skills such as managing risk and taking choices.
• Family households: financial education will encourage low income citizens to save some part of their incomes and face unforeseen events.
• Elderly are a privileged target for the project because financial literacy is an important skill for them to acquire: they often have low literacy but relatively high wealth and an increased need of awareness of pension provisiont. Moreover, with age, cognition declines and people is more exposed to risk of being cheated or deceived on financial matters.

IMPACT:
The impacts envisaged are:

• awareness rising in the target countries.
• improvement of basic financial skills for target users.
• availability of tools for trainers and social workers involved in financial education for vulnerable adults in target countries.