The World Health Organization (WHO) suggests that the ideal weight in kilograms for children between 2 and 10 years of age is the height in centimeters minus 60 multiplied by 0.7+10. That is, a 100 cm tall child should weigh 100-60 which gives 40, multiplied by 0.7 which gives 28; add 10 and we get 38 kilos. In pounds that would be 83 pounds.
Suppose a mother proudly displays her 100 cm son weighing 140 pounds. She boasts that she has “fed him very well” and that it is remarkable how she has made him grow in size. Then it is discovered that the child is already pre-diabetic and has complications from inadequate diet, has childhood obesity, and that the child's health has been complicated.
Something like this is happening with the Superintendent of Popular and Solidarity Economy. She has gone out to the media to boast about the great growth of the country's cooperative system, the large amount of credit they have granted and the massive deposits they have collected during the years of her administration.
Well, we must tell her that as that irresponsible mother, she has not done her job well.
Overweight and obesity in Ecuador
Explosive growth in the financial sector is associated with risk. Ecuador's cooperatives are, relative to GDP and relative to the size of the financial system, the largest in the continent.
They have not had the same requirements as the banks, neither in liquidity, nor in equity, nor in provisions and reserves, and their explosive growth is showing today two very worrying variables, about which the superintendent did not speak: the deficiency in provisions, because while the banking system has around 200 % of provisions, the cooperative system does not even reach half. The other is the delinquency of the portfolio, which is almost three times that of the banking system.
So what is the point of boasting about this growth? The Superintendency of Popular and Solidarity Economy was warned by many technicians, many years ago, that the same rules and controls should be established for cooperatives as for banks, since, just like banks, they receive money from the public and place it in loans.
This was not done, the process of putting cooperatives in order was systematically displaced and postponed for years, and that is why hundreds have disappeared, and the system today, despite the fact that there are very well managed cooperatives, shows serious signs that it urgently needs an authority to discipline them and demand the same conditions of capitalization, provisions, reserves and liquidity as the banks have.
There is an urgent need for change in the institution and rapid action to strengthen and control this important sector of the national financial system.
Just as there are standards to know if a person is at the right weight, there are standards to know if financial institutions are in the right parameters. The discourse of “great achievements” may deceive many, but not those who have the technical tools to know the truth. (O)
Source: eluniverse.com
