Governor of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB), Timothy Antoine, has announced that come September 2020, the polymer five-dollar banknotes are expected to be in circulation.
He made the announcement during a press briefing held at the ECCB Agency office at the Financial Centre in Roseau recently.
In June 2019, use of the polymer banknotes began with the circulation of the EC$50 banknotes. This was followed by the EC$100, EC$20 and EC$10 in August.
“The five-dollar bill should come later this year, so I would say September, at this point in time, based on where we are…,” he said
According to Antoine, the use of polymer banknotes has gone pretty well.
However, he said there have been a few issues in some of the ATM’s.
“Those are being resolved but for the most part, the roll-out has gone smoothly in most of our countries, everything, including the ten-dollar note,” he stated.
Meantime, Antoine said, the ECCB continues to be “very gratified” by the feedback from the visually impaired, “with the bumps at the left-hand top corner of the note because that really helps them.”
“They now feel empowered to spend their own money as opposed to being taken advantage of by people,” the ECCB Governor said.
The ECCB decided to change the material on which the EC banknotes are printed from paper to polymer since the polymer banknotes are said to be cleaner, safer, and stronger.
That will be good. But can’t stand the look of lizbeth and what she represents, the enslavement of much of the world’s population.
Why is the Queen still on our money? Do we know our history? After everything these people did to our ancestors we still have them as the face of our money? Why don’t our leaders respect us enough to put one of our own on it? Why not Mary Eugenia Charles face? Or a leader from the region?
In terms of being environmentally friendly, what could be better for the Caribbean than a high quality paper can be made from the discarded stems of banana plants.
Many Far Eastern Countries use banana paper for their bank notes. Research has shown that the paper has a shelf life of over 100 years and can be folded as many as 3,000 times.
Banana paper is one of many papers that I make from Dominica’s abundant natural resources.