agenda, this year ’ s workshop aims to discuss two key areas that were approved by the membership earlier. these two topics namely, digital id / e - kyc and financing and facilitation of foreign terrorist fighters, are timely given the current development in our region. allow me to touch briefly on these two topics. digital id / e - kyc the rapid technology advancement in the last decade has led to significant innovations in the financial sector. then came the covid - 19 pandemic, which has accelerated the need for financial institutions around the world to shift their operations onto the digitalised platforms. digital id / e - kyc is one such innovation and the authorities have responded accordingly. for example : aml / cft regulators, such as bangladesh, hong kong, india and malaysia, have started introducing guidelines and policies on e - kyc ; and governments have also started exploring the establishment of digital id platforms to facilitate e - kyc, as seen in singapore and thailand among others. 1 / 3 bis central bankers'speeches a conversation on this subject is also timely in view of the recent issuance of the financial action task force ’ s ( fatf ) guidance on digital identity in march 2020. participants should seize the occasion to share experience in facilitating the adoption of e - kyc while ensuring compliance with the relevant fatf standards. as technology enhances the efficiency of the financial sector, i have no doubt that the shift towards digitalisation will continue to accelerate. we as regulators should strive to facilitate this transformation while being cognisant and vigilant of the risks that this can pose to the stability and integrity of the financial system, including ml / tf risks. in this respect, authorities could play our part by ensuring that all aml / cft measures remain relevant and appropriate as well as assisting the financial institutions in complying with aml / cft requirements. as regulators, it is imperative for us to strike a fine balance between facilitating innovation and safeguarding our financial system from any form of abuse. financing and facilitation of foreign terrorists fighters as approved in the apg 2019 annual meeting, apg has collaborated with the global centre on cooperative security, towards producing a typology report on financial profiles of foreign fighters and returnees in southeast asia. this report comes at an opportune time as there have been growing concerns that terrorist groups are using the pandemic outbreak to advance their propaganda and fundraising efforts. although the risk seems muted at the

most research. stanley fischer, for example, concluded that if a country with inflation of 10 percent becomes a country with inflation of 110 percent, its annual growth rate would fall 4 percentage points ; the consequences of this for standards of living can hardly be overemphasized. this effect may help to explain why east asia, where inflation has been relatively low on average, has been more successful than latin america, where many countries have suffered bouts of hyperinflation. more generally, latin america provides a good example of both the deleterious effects of macroeconomic instability and the benefits of putting sound policies in place. between 1975 and 1990, when many latin american countries struggled with large budget deficits and high inflation, average per capita income in these countries expanded at a pace of just ½ percent per year. economic performance in the region improved markedly in the early 1990s, as these countries reduced inflation, liberalized their foreign exchange regime, increased their openness to trade, and developed their financial markets. more recently, while argentina, brazil, and several other countries in the region have experienced economic disruptions, mexico and chile have remained relatively insulated, apparently reflecting market confidence that these countries are committed to sound policies. mexico is a particularly interesting case. in the two decades before 1995, the mexican economy suffered several severe crises. yet in recent years, with the implementation of nafta, a floating exchange rate regime, relatively stable fiscal policies, and much lower inflation, mexico's vulnerability appears to have declined markedly. this country now seems to be viewed by international investors as a relative " safe haven " within the region. as easterly and levine indicate, much of africa's plight can also be linked to macroeconomic instability. empirical evidence suggests that africa's large government budget deficits, underdeveloped financial markets, and black - market foreign - exchange premiums ( which likely proxy for a host of deficiencies in the financial and legal system ) apparently explain roughly half the growth divergence between east asia and africa over the past several decades. in other words, these results suggest to easterly and levine that growth of per capita annual income in africa would have been about 2 - 1 / 2 percentage points a year higher had countries in africa followed policies adopted by the east asian economies. central bank independence has not received a great deal of attention in the recent literature on growth. given the importance of keeping inflation under control, the policies of the central bank - - and the freedom of the