ARC displays a passion for progress
The 2010 African Regional Conference ended on 6 May in buoyant mood
Published on 01 Jun 2010
Opening the
SWIFT African Regional Conference at the Sandton Convention Centre on 4 May,
Javier Pérez-Tasso, head of Western Europe, Middle East and Africa, SWIFT, set the scene for the conference and highlighted four key areas of action for SWIFT in Africa: market infrastructures; regional integration; remittances; and consulting services.
SWIFT CEO, Lázaro Campos, meanwhile outlined SWIFT's 2015 strategy overall direction. All of SWIFT’s ambitions boil down to key overriding areas of focus, Campos suggested: reducing
TCO and improving interoperability, while becoming more local. He left the audience with a question: "What do we need to do to be your default choice?" he asked. "We want the SWIFT card to be your strategic ace."
These
opening remarks set the framework for much of the discussion that took place over the next few days.
Market Infrastructures
Payments market infrastructures are one of the success stories of the African region with RTGS systems now in place in over 20 markets. Discussion has now moved to other areas of market infrastructure, notably in the area of securities.
In Africa, delegates heard, there is still much to be done in building securities market infrastructure. As
Emmanuel Munyukwi, CEO, the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange told the
securities plenary, “Technology does not come cheap”. Markets should therefore consider making use of what others in the region have developed.
Regional integration
Implicit in this approach is movement towards closer regional ties and regional integration was an important focus of discussions during the conference. Alice Zanza, senior financial sector specialist, The World Bank, argued that the key drivers for regional integration are political actions in support of increased trading activity. “The World Bank believes that there has to be a business case for regional integration,” she told delegates in the Tuesday afternoon plenary on regional integration.
Other panellists pointed to existing success stories in regional initiatives. On the payments side,
Patrick Byabakama-Kaberenge, head of audit and a former deputy governor, Bank of Uganda outlined progress in the East African Community (EAC) in linking RTGS systems in East Africa. SADC, meanwhile, is aiming at 2018 for a single currency with consolidated infrastructure. Dave Mitchell, head of the National Payment System, the South African Reserve Bank, told delegates that much progress has been made along the way to that ambitious goal.
On the issue of sharing infrastructure,
Tertius Vermeulen, COO, Computershare, insisted that, “it is a myth that exchanges and CSDs must run their own systems,” By way of example,
Ibrahim Bello, director of transformation, Securities and Exchange Commission, Nigeria pointed to francophone West African countries, who have set up a regional CSD for their exchanges.
Remittances
On the question of remittances, Pérez-Tasso pointed out that they are the first line of foreign direct investment into many countries. There is a diversity of requirements in the region when it comes to supporting retail services such as remittances and low value payments. In this regard,
SWIFT CFO, Francis Vanbever told in the
SWIFT plenary session, "The community needs to take a leadership role." Building on this, Harry Newman commented that in the past, there was a tendency to say, "This is SWIFT; eat it, it's good for you." Now, however, customer input is essential to ensuring that SWIFT’s offering meets the region’s requirements.
Consulting services
Introduced to the African Regional Conference for the first time, consulting services attracted a great deal of enthusiasm. “I am particularly encouraged by SWIFT’s orientation towards consulting,” said Marcellin Zinsou, Banque Atlantique, Côte d’Ivoire. It would, said Zinsou, help both his institution and his community leverage their investment in SWIFT most effectively.
“This conference has as usual been passionate,” noted Rob Green, SWIFT Board member, during a closing plenary panel. “Rather than Africa having to align itself with SWIFT 2015, we have discovered this week that SWIFT 2015 is aligned with Africa.”
