employees to possess traits of passion, conviction and compassion that the women display in abundance. the sense of empathy and understanding that the women possess enables them to earn respect and acceptability of their co - workers. expert studies highlight that women are more adapt in dealing with concerns of employees, shareholders and customers. they are not only good at collating and combining information, their better intuitive abilities also helps them to make informed decisions. as leaders, the women bring in an environment of strength, confidence, inclusiveness and trust. it is no wonder then that women have risen remarkably to the top in the banking sector in both – the public and private sector in india. i urge this bunch of young women graduates today to choose finance and banking as their career option where they can really excel and serve the customers and society with distinction. 12. as you must be aware, the hon ’ ble union finance minister shri p. chidambaram has proposed in this year ’ s union budget that an all - women public sector bank will soon be set up, which will predominantly employ and lend to women. this is, indeed, a very welcome step and will also, in a sense ; help take forward the reserve bank ’ s financial inclusion and financial literacy efforts, which also strongly focus on women ’ s awareness about and access to financial services. 13. the world of banking has, in fact, been a mirror of history at large. “ money makes the world go around ”, the saying goes. banking activities resemble a wheel turning continually. banking in india too has gone through many phases. while historians can slice the past into countless slivers, in terms of transformational change, there have been only a few inflexion points in post - independence banking in india. 14. the first was the enactment of the banking regulation act, 1949 which brought in a comprehensive and formal structure of bank regulation and supervision in india. the nationalization of banks in our country in 1969 marked the second such point. it generated forces that took banking beyond the elite class to the masses. it led to the establishment of a very substantial infrastructure across the geographical expanse of the country and was, thus, a critical trigger for financial outreach of institutions and empowerment of the common man. the third inflexion point in banking was the financial sector reforms initiative that was launched in the early 1990s. 15. these reform measures were initiated and sequenced to create an enabling environment for banks to overcome the external constraints – these were related

strengthen loan quality is that of the valuation of property. in a recent survey on real estate lending by bou, the majority of commercial banks reported concerns about valuation standards and some indicated that they have faced challenges realizing the value for collateral because of inflated valuation reports. a key gap appears to be the lack of a uniform industry standard. i think that it would be useful for the uba to work with stakeholders to develop common guidelines and standards in this area. looking ahead ; i am confident that the banking industry in uganda can innovate to reduce the cost of financial services, broaden the range of services available to customers and widen access to financial services, in particular through the adoption of digital financial services. since 2009 we have witnessed the exponential growth of mobile money transactions, which is radically transforming the way in which payments and money transfers are made in uganda. for instance, in the year to june 2017 ; there were over one billion transactions worth over shs. 52 trillion ( about half of uganda ’ s nominal gdp ) on the mobile money platforms. the challenge now is to bring about a similar transformation in the way in which other types of financial services, such as savings and credit products, can be delivered to customers and at lower costs. finally, the advent of digital financial platforms such as mobile money was seen by some commentators as competition to the formal financial services sector. to the contrary, these digital platforms have crowded in more users into the formal financial system, with the number of accounts in commercial banks increasing from 4. 5 million as at june 2015 to 7. 4 million as at june 2017 ; while number of accounts in financial institutions licensed by the bou ( commercial banks, credit institutions and mdis ) rose by 3. 3 million over a two year period to 9. 3 million accounts as at june 2017. thank you for listening and i wish you a joyous festive season.