over the last three decades for the rural economies of this region, have been, to some extent, positively influenced by cictab. in this scenario, cictab has become very prominent for us as it conducts various training programs with special focus on cooperatives and rural development by providing a common platform to the agricultural and rural development institutions of its member countries. nepal rastra bank, as a member of cictab, would like to assure the centre that it will continue to support the centre ’ s objective of providing a common platform to the agricultural and rural development institutions of its member countries by imparting comprehensive and top quality training, seminars and workshops. ladies and gentlemen, looking over the program schedule i am happy to note that many topical and interesting issues are covered. i am confident that there will be a most active participation and exchange of ideas from the participants over the next five days, which will contribute positively to their respective institutions development. i also hope that all the participants, especially our foreign guests, will also have time to enjoy both the beauty and the flavor of nepalese culture. thank you very much and my best wishes for the successful conclusion of this program!

indicators remain at very high levels, which suggests that the favourable economic developments we are seeing are here to stay for the time being. looking at ecb staff projections, gdp growth rates are expected to come in at 2. 4 % this year, 1. 9 % in 2019 and 1. 7 % in 2020. despite the fact that economic conditions picked up, price pressures in the euro area remained sluggish. while higher oil prices and the robust upswing did cause inflation to grow much more briskly in 2017 than it had one year earlier, headline inflation slipped again slightly at the start of 2018. the subdued domestic price pressures reflect the fact that some countries are still trying to boost their price competitiveness by keeping wages down. but domestic price pressures are subdued even in countries that weren ’ t at the epicentre of the crisis. in germany, for instance, the immigration of workers from other eu countries over the past few years has resulted in a marked decrease in wage pressures. there is also some evidence to suggest that additional factors, such as the increased significance of global value chains, have eased price pressures, and not just in the euro area. however, according to ecb staff projections, price pressures will pick up again due to further rises in aggregate capacity utilisation. the ecb ’ s economists expect the inflation rate to amount to 1. 4 % in both 2018 and 2019, before rising to 1. 7 % in 2020 – in other words, to a figure that is broadly in keeping with our definition of price stability over the medium term. with that in mind, it is no surprise that, for some time now, the expectation on the financial markets has been for net asset purchases to come to an end in 2018 already. but even after net asset purchases have become a thing of the past, the monetary policy stance will remain accommodative. ultimately, the degree of monetary policy accommodation is determined not so much by the monthly volume of net asset purchases as by the overall volume of purchases. and that volume is huge – the eurosystem ’ s asset purchases under the current programme are already worth more than €2. 3 trillion and consist largely of government bonds. that stock of assets will remain steady even after the net purchases are stopped, because the ecb governing council decided some time ago that the proceeds from maturing assets should continue to be reinvested for an extended period of time. furthermore, it announced that its policy rates will remain at their current levels