? today i hope to provide some preliminary responses to these questions. i hope that you will spend time unpacking them in the remaining sessions of the conference. 1 / 4 bis - central bankers'speeches first : how do we support the scaling up of blended finance? the ngfs recently published several recommendations on how financial regulators and central banks can support the scaling up of blended instruments. these recommendations were based on several case studies which discussed recent experiences with blended finance instruments. our assessment is that financial regulators and central banks can help with increasing blended finance only as part of a broader country approach to addressing obstacles to climate finance. some of the obstacles to blended finance include the absence of project pipelines or macroeconomic instability due to fiscal crisis. these two obstacles require intervention from fiscal authorities and other parts of government. for some developing countries that are in debt destress, debt restructuring is required, indicating that the success of blended finance instruments in these countries is directly linked to the work of the global sovereign debt roundtable and mechanisms such as the g20 common framework for debt treatments. examples of focus areas for central banks and regulators include addressing data gaps so that financial institutions can price risk appropriately, embedding climate considerations in governance and risk management practices, and understanding the risk profile of different instruments so that these can be treated appropriately in the microprudential framework. data gaps remain a major obstacle to increasing climate financing. financial regulators have an important role to play in addressing these gaps. using appropriate taxonomy and disclosure rules in their regulatory and supervisory approaches can improve information flows and enhance the operations of financial markets. embedding climate considerations in the governance and risk management practices of financial firms helps manage climate - related risks more effectively and improves the allocation of capital across the economy. the ngfs's work on transition planning provides important guidelines on how financial institutions can incorporate climate considerations in all aspects of their operations and manage climate - related risks during the transition. another important area to support the scaling up of blended instruments is around their risk treatment in the regulatory and supervisory frameworks. financial regulators face increasing pressure to reduce the risk weights associated with blended financial instruments. lower weights can decrease capital costs and support the expansion of blended finance. this brings us to our second question. how do we identify the risks embedded in different blended instruments? in many cases, reducing the risk weights of blended instruments is justified. but is it justified in all cases? we face several challenges in our regulatory treatment of blended instrument. for example :

for financial stability. so it ’ s very important that we explain our role, and our policy decisions, as clearly – and to as wide an audience – as we can. and it was partly these considerations that prompted our new programme of public and educational outreach, launched last year. however, they weren ’ t the only considerations. in a moment i ’ ll outline what this outreach effort involves. i then want to say something about the importance of personal financial education. there are two distinct parts to the strategy. one involves visits to secondary schools. below director level, more than 400 people working at the bank have volunteered as “ ambassadors ”, who explain to school pupils what we do and why. people on our policy committees do the same. it ’ s now rare that, on one of my regular trips around the country to hear from businesses about what ’ s going on in the economy, i don ’ t also make a visit to a local school. in all, we reckon we ’ ve talked to 12 % of the uk ’ s state secondary schools in the past 18 months alone. all speeches are available online at www. bankofengland. co. uk / news / speeches for our part, we very much enjoy these visits. and the feedback has also been good. central banks are not often associated with the words “ positive ”, “ appreciated ” and “ inspiring ” so you can imagine how invigorated our ambassadors are when they hear them. the second strand is a package of online materials – something we ’ ve named “ econome ” – to help non - specialist teachers of students aged between 11 - 16 years deliver quality financial education. econome comprises three one - hour lessons focussing on financial decision - making and the implications of these decisions on students and the world around them. the resource draws on real - world examples, provided by the bank of england, which shows how the bank makes decisions and the practical skills we employ to understand the likely outcomes of those decisions. these examples include the impact of interest rate rises on different agents ( such as a bank manager, car manufacturer and consumer ) and analysing the cost of a basket of goods to explain how inflation is measured. as part of the resource, econome features interactive videos, in which bank of england staff explain how they deal with these issues in the course of our everyday work. it is designed to help young people understand the economy better and provide them with the analytical skills to make informed decisions