Banks urged to be trendsetters in good governance

FINANCIAL institutions should play their part in efforts towards eradicating poverty and attainment of Sustainable Development Goals in the country.

This was said on 7 May 2019 by Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Deputy Governor Dr Jesimen Chipika when she officially opened the 2019 MEFMI Forum for Deputy Principal/Permanent Secretaries and Deputy Governors Forum.

Dr Chipika said most African states were affected by global economic changes hence the need for good governance. She said finance ministries and central banks in Africa should be trend setters in good governance for effective management of resources.

“It’s our role as fiscal and monetary policy custodians to ensure that we move in tandem with the rest of the world in eradicating poverty and attaining the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” Dr Chipika said.

“We’re gathered at a time when both the global economy and our economies are undergoing major changes posing new challenges as well as opportunities to microeconomic stability and growth.

“Governance is critical for Africa because such discourse is intensifying and trust deficit is growing in some institutions.

“In line with good practice, finance ministries and central banks in the MEFMI region should be viewed as trend setters in governance because as a region we can’t afford to lag behind on matters that affect the efficient and effective operations of our institutions.”

Dr Chipika said some African countries were making efforts to improve governance in order to improve policy outcomes despite the challenges.

She called for transparency, accountability, independence and fairness as basic tenets of governance saying this would increase public trust in the management of the financial system and its associated fiscal and monetary policy outcomes.

“It’s my sincere hope that this forum will allow us policy makers to draw from each other’s experiences on how our different environments have impacted on the evolvement of governance in our institutions and its effects on fiscal and monetary policy formulation and its outcomes and basic tenets of good governance of public financial services.

“The outcome of the above is a strong public financial system, which is important for strengthening democratic governance, micro economic stability, and effective use of scarce resources for broad based and inclusive wealth creation for poverty reduction,” said Dr Chipika.

The forum, which ended on Wednesday 8 May 2019, was organised by MEFMI in partnership with Crown Agents Investment Management, an international financial organisation that manages central banks’ balances.

Crown Agents deputy chief executive officer and chief invent officer, Mr Ritesh Anand said independence of central banks was key to development and attainment of SDGs in every country.

MEFMI is a regional financial institute with 14 member states from Eastern and Southern Africa and 10 of them attended the conference.

By Leonard Ncube in Victoria Falls

Twitter – @ncubeleon