hand, you have merchants arguing that the fees levied by banks are too high and that without those fees, they could offer products at reduced price to customers. the battle over the swipe fees is in full swing – each party hotly defending his position. my concern as a regulator here is that financial institutions should of course be able to cover their costs but, at the same time, the customer should get a fair deal. this leads me to my second advice to you : make sure that information on credit terms is available to your customers, and equally important, that they fully understand them – this will enable them to use their cards wisely. we can draw our inspiration from us credit card accountability act of 2009. the law protects consumer rights and abolishes the “ predatory ” lending practices i referred to earlier. one of the requirements is that monthly credit card statements should include information on how much that credit is actually costing the consumer. the statement now indicates the amount of time it will take for the client to pay off his balance if he only makes the minimum payments. it also indicates how much he needs to pay each month to get rid of that balance in three years. such requirements go a long way bis central bankers ’ speeches towards a better management of credit card debt in a country which has about 54 million households with credit card debt – each carrying over 3, 000 dollars. if these requirements are good for post - crisis us, they surely have some interest for us. our banking act ( 2004 ) makes it mandatory on financial institutions to disclose information on credit terms, while not being as specific as the more recent us law. i would urge customers to pay attention to those terms to avoid paying interest which could instead have gone in a savings product. financial institutions do not spare any effort to promote the use of cards – they offer exclusive discounts in restaurants and shops, insurance covers, gift vouchers ; frequent card users can even win cars. we are becoming a consumerist society – which brings me to my third concern : the savings culture is losing ground. over a ten - year span, we note that the savings rate nearly halved, declining from 26. 3 per cent in 2000 to 14. 4 per cent in 2010. concurrently final household consumption has risen from 60. 3 per cent in 2000 to 74. 8 cent in 2010. we are witnessing a radical societal change since the last decade. a new economic model is taking shape – lenders are manufacturing more credit facilities, and

had a charity dinner in this very venue in aid of the epilepsy and alzheimer associations. • last week, i inaugurated with the minister of agro industry and fisheries, dr a. boolell, a bamboo garden at midlands and we trust that other banks present here will follow suit with their own contributions to sustain the bio - diversity of our island. • we have also sponsored the inter clubs youth championships for boys and girls. • you have just heard about the banknote design competition that we launched. the idea behind this was that people of my generation normally look to the past for our heroes and then we proceed to put their faces on our notes and their effigies on our coins and we thought that, perhaps, the younger generation may have a different take on this issue. so, we thought to give them a chance to design the future family of our banknotes. the results of this competition were just announced by the chairman of the jury panel, mr tristan breville. i would like here to thank mr breville and all his colleagues who worked on the jury panel and all those who participated in the competition and of course, a special word of congratulations to the winners. i am now pleased to move to the next stage of our event. we have three different launching events here tonight : ( i ) the first is the launching of a special commemorative coin which marks our 40th anniversary. it is a silver - proof coin and will go on sale as from monday 10 december. ( ii ) the next, a sort of double first, is the twenty rupee coin we are launching today, the first of its kind in mauritius. and the second part of this double first, is that this new coin, is the first bimetallic coin we have ever had in mauritius. ( iii ) and the next item today involves a triple, a triple signature. as you know, the central bank now has two deputy governors. the new banknotes being issued today from the old family carry, for the first time, three signatures. so, if i may say, rather pleasingly, we celebrate today a first, the commemorative coin ; a double first, the bimetallic twenty rupee coin ; and a triple first, the new notes with three signatures. now it is my pleasure and honour to invite our vice - president, the honourable angidi chettiar to unveil the coins and notes which will join our family of notes and coins. i thank you for your