vikram punchoo : international financial reporting standards ifrs 9 opening remarks by mr vikram punchoo, second deputy governor of the bank of mauritius, at the imf afritac south seminar on international financial reporting standards 9, ebene, 3 april 2017. * * * ladies and gentlemen a very good morning to you i feel privileged to be here today with you all speaking at the opening session of this seminar on ifrs9. i am grateful to the director and senior people of afritac south for having taken on board a suggestion i made during the steering committee held in mauritius in 2016 to host a seminar on ifrs9. i wish to thank them for their commitment and dedication to improve in many ways the work of supervisors in sub - saharan africa. often we fail to appreciate the organisational efforts required to bring together so many participants and getting the experts to fly down to mauritius to share their technical expertise. a big thank you to the organisers of this seminar. i am sure ifrs 9 will be less of a conundrum at the end of this seminar for all the participants and they will gain a lot of insights about how best to implement ifrs9 in their own respective jurisdictions. i am looking forward to hear from the bank of mauritius participants in particular on how best we can implement ifrs9 in mauritius as from next monday. this seminar on ifrs9 comes at an opportune time indeed though i would have wished it had happened earlier. the implementation of ifrs 9 is a major challenge not only for the banks but also for the regulator as well. it is a race against time as january 2018 is only 9 months away. i am still unclear about the state of preparedness and extent of understanding about ifrs9 among the domestic and smaller banks and this makes me quite nervous. international banks present in mauritius would lean on their group expertise. at the outset, let me tell you that i am not an accountant and accounting was something i did not really like at college. so you would not expect me to talk to you about all the intricacies, subtleties and complexities of ifrs9. i am an economist by training. my interest in ifrs9 is very recent and confined to its implications for banking regulation. to be honest, the first time i came across ifrs9 was at a meeting at the bank with kpmg experts from south africa sometime in late 2015 or early 2016. i was briefed about how kpmg

. he leads a team of trade professionals specialized in trade relationship management, risk mitigation strategies, logistic management, structured trade, new trade services and emerging payment channel instruments to provide integrated solutions to financial institutions and corporate clients. prior to his current role, asif was head of trade sales for europe, middle east and africa as well as for the firm ’ s global network trade business. he also worked at jpmorgan new york for 7 years and managed various trade teams. asif is a regular speaker of trade industry conferences and has written articles on trade & logistics management. he is also member of asian advisory council of bankers ’ association for finance and trade. 3. mr subin subaiah mr subin subaiah is a senior vice president of bank of america, heading their global treasury services business across the financial institutions client space in asia. prior to joining bank of america in june 2005, mr subaiah spent 6 years with deutsche bank, singapore where he held the position of managing director in charge of fi relationship management and had business line responsibilities for deutsche ’ s cash and trade business in south / south east asia and australia. mr subaiah spent his first twenty years in banking with bankers trust company holding a variety of senior positions in india, hong kong and singapore in their transaction banking and investment banking businesses, covering clients across asia. thank you.