The banking landscape of Bangladesh is changing rapidly. The industry is passing through fresher challenges in a critical environment attributed by the Covid-19 devastations and global macroeconomic instability, said Bangladesh Bank Governor Abdur Rouf Talukder on Saturday.
He said encouraging ‘Sustainable Banking’ for promoting sustainable growth became particularly crucial in this circumstance where adoption of technology became a necessity.
The central bank governor made the observations while addressing the inaugural session of two day Annual Banking Conference 'ABC 2022' as chief guest, organised by Bangladesh Institute Bank Management (BIBM) at the BIBM premises.
The Director General of BIBM, Dr. Md. Akhteruzzaman presided over the session while Dr. Muzzaffar Ahmed Chair Professor & Supernumerary Professor of BIBM, Professors and other academicians for home and abroad, central bankers and top bank executives; researchers from home and abroad, faculty members of BIBM were present on the occasion.
He mentioned that with the evolution of technology, the entire industry has undergone a massive transformation that has changed the way financial procedures are carried out, and the way financial institutions operate.
"The collaboration between finance and technology has led to a radical change that is expected to reshape the financial sector, business models and banking structures. This paradigm change has posed significant challenges to the banks as well as the regulators. One of the important challenges is ‘compliance’; a very important aspect for sustainable success story for any banking and financial system", Governor said. Government and the Central Bank of Bangladesh have been very active in offering right kind of environment for handling environmental and social risks in business and economic activities. Sustainable banking has been policy-driven where Bangladesh Bank has been playing leading role, and financial inclusion has been a major policy goal for the country. Regarding the major initiative in financial inclusion, we are aware that National Financial Inclusion Strategy Administrative Unit started operation in the Bangladesh Bank premises for implementing recently approved ‘National Financial Inclusion Strategy’. It is the responsibility of the banking industry and other associated stakeholders to take these policy and strategic drives forward for the sake of the sustainable development. It is very important for banks to demonstrate a good compliance culture to maintain their reputation and win the trust of customers, investors and regulators. A good compliance culture can benefit banks in several ways covering more adequately organizational and individual risk; better shielding reputational risk; confidence among employees while performing their jobs; help attracting and retain talent and ensure employee engagement; improved transparency which enables better decisions; enhanced relationship with regulators and other stakeholders; and enhanced valuation of the entity among investors.
While addressing, the BIBM Director General, Dr. Akhterujjaman mentioned that the Annual Banking Conference 2022 is ninth endeavour of the institute to bring the academicians, researchers, bankers and other relevant stakeholders on the same platform to share knowledge and experiences in the banking and financial sector. He said that the endeavour for searching, creating and disseminating knowledge will certainly help the policymakers, regulators and practitioners in devising news policy decisions to meet the challenges and grasp the opportunities in the future.
Chairman of the Organizing Committee of ABC 2022 Professor Dr. Shah Md. Ahsan Habib said ABC is an Annual Knowledge Platform for sharing information, facts, figures, and their analyses on banking issues.
BIBM has been organizing the Annual Banking Conference since 2012 aiming at bringing together experts, academicians, and researchers to exchange and share knowledge, experience, and research outputs on banking and related issues.
