or sustainable, growth rate. the acceleration in productivity growth in the united states in the late 1990s, for example, led us to revise our estimates of how fast the economy was likely to be able to grow at that time without undermining price stability. we also face considerable ignorance about the precise channels through which policy actions ultimately affect the economy, as well as how long those effects will take to show up and how large they will be when they do show up. as you would expect, this makes it difficult to assess in advance, or even in real time, the amount of loosening or tightening that is likely to be necessary to achieve the goals of central banks. even if we had precise knowledge of key economic relationships, our ability to assess economic conditions in real time would be impeded by data limitations. though most modern central banks implicitly or explicitly target some measure of inflation, the host of issues surrounding the proper definition and measurement of inflation for policy purposes is daunting. in general, most economic data are subject to sampling error and so cannot simply be taken at face value. also, many of the series we rely on are subject to revision as more or better information becomes available, and potentially can even be redefined in a way that makes the history of the series less useful for interpreting current movements. finally, data are often reported with a significant enough delay to limit their use as a read on current conditions. but, even if we knew the model and data with certainty, it is impossible to perfectly predict the evolution of factors that are largely beyond the influence of current monetary policy but that would likely affect our policy today if we knew for sure how they would look tomorrow. one way to say this is that we simply cannot know what types of " shocks " are likely to hit the economy or when they will hit. and even as they impact the economy, the appropriate policy response may not be obvious because it may be difficult to assess in real time the probable duration of the shock and whether it is demand driven or supply driven. even at a one - year horizon, which for policy purposes is not a very long time, there is considerable uncertainty surrounding forecasts of gdp growth. for example, the survey of professional forecasters reports that on average 50 economists attach a 90 percent probability to an outcome for real gdp growth for 2007 that ranges from 1. 0 percent to 5. 0 percent. the width of this band of confidence or uncertainty is similar to that in the published forecasts of

also been conducting joint seminars such as this one to share experiences and learn from one another. this workshop therefore comes at such an opportune moment to assist our central banks to achieve the internal and regional objectives. the workshop offers various opportunities to all of us in a number of ways : • first, this is an opportunity to jointly re - assess and evaluate our performance in the areas of business continuity management and risk management over the period. • secondly, it provides us with an opportunity to learn from organisations that have run risk management and business continuity programs for many years. • third, this is an opportunity for each of our central banks with programs in their infancy to lay the correct foundation to implement sound and resilient risk management and business continuity programs. • fourth, this is an opportunity to obtain uniform training for each of the key players in their respective roles. with a common foundation, the objective of harmonisation in the region will draw closer to reality. bank of uganda would greatly benefit if the following areas are specifically addressed within this workshop : • performance measurement : what are the key indicators that central bank management should use to know that their business continuity and / or risk management programs are giving them the intended benefits? • evaluation : how does the central bank evaluate performance over time and which tools are recommended? • reporting : what should be reported about risk and business continuity at the different levels of the organisation including the board? • incident reporting and monitoring : how does the central bank ensure that all risk incidents are systematically reported and monitored? • culture change : what are the different approaches to organisational culture change towards risk and business continuity? i would like to conclude by again thanking you all for coming to this workshop and to thank the centre for central bank studies and the centre for technical central bank cooperation for the technical support. bank of uganda is greatly indebted to them. i wish you fruitful deliberations. it is now my pleasure to declare this workshop officially opened.