Operation_HOPE_Logo_(New) Operation HOPE Founder’s role in Paris forum will help ensure goal of
recognizing stakeholder voices before the G-8 meetings and summits

LOS ANGELES, CA – June 24, 2009 – In the grip of one of the worst economic crises of modern times “Silver Rights Entrepreneur,” and Operation HOPE (HOPE) Founder, Chairman and CEO John Hope Bryant will participate in the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) Forum 2009 in Paris this week, ensuring that the voice of “local citizens globally” are heard.

Bryant’s involvement follows last week’s HOPE Global Financial Literacy Summit. The first-ever global summit held in the Anacostia neighborhood of Washington, DC. There, he hosted more than 800 attendees representing over 35 countries and 6 continents. Bryant’s longtime role in the global economic development community, and his ability to address the needs of the underserved through financial literacy empowerment makes him a key contributor to the OECD Forum, which is the most significant international meeting of the year for OECD.

“As a campaigner for the underserved, HOPE recognizes the need to come together globally to restore stability, confidence and sustainable economic growth, end the crisis and lay the foundation for a stronger, cleaner and fairer global economy,” says Bryant, who also serves as Vice Chair of the U.S. President’s Advisory Council on Financial Literacy. “Of course education is fundamental for any sustainable recovery to be effective. HOPE’s ‘silver rights’ mission to eradicate poverty and empower the underserved is grounded in financial literacy, and anchored on the simple principle that it’s not how much you earn, but learning how to make the most of what you earn.”

Focused on education, Bryant’s panel discusses the economic crisis in terms of the reduction of public budgets, or higher tuition fees and its impact on an individual’s opportunity to obtain a higher education, and how conversely education, and financial literacy education, can serve as both a hedge against poverty, and likewise an economic driver for a new generation of growth in a knowledge economy and an information age. He is joined by the OECD Director for Education Barbara Ischinger and Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Professor of Physiology at the University of Sydney, John Hearn.

This year marks the 10th year of the OECD Annual Forum, with a week’s worth of events between high-level panels of experts and diverse, motivated, audiences brought together to discuss making a cleaner, fairer, stronger economy. Last year some 1700 attendees representing over 68 countries attended the meetings. For the last 10 years OCED has worked to provide stakeholder groups with a public media forum to debate and express its issues before the G-8 Ministerial Council Meetings and G-8 Summits. Recommendations coming out of this OECD Forum will be formalized into recommendations to be considered by Ministers in preparation for the G-8.

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About Operation HOPE, Inc.
Operation HOPE is America's leading nonprofit social investment banking and financial literacy empowerment organization. With more than 400 private sector partners, 1500 nonprofit organizations and schools, and 100 government partners in 30 major U.S. cities as well as South Africa, HOPE has raised more than $400 million in its pursuit of educating, assisting and inspiring the next generation of global stakeholders. Through international initiatives and its three principal programs, Banking on Our Future (teaching school children about money), HOPE Coalition America (Mortgage HOPE Crisis Hotline, 1-888-388-HOPE, financial emergency preparedness and disaster relief), and Walk-In HOPE Centers (loans, bill pay, computer literacy, understanding banking principles), Operation HOPE has assumed the responsibility of piloting the “Silver Rights Movement” towards making free enterprise and capitalism relevant to all underserved communities. For more information about HOPE visit www.operationhope.org.

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