challenges facing our pacific islands. i congratulate all our researchers who will be presenting their work during the conference. the research papers are the culmination of critical thinking and innovative proposals that should be encouraged to the next step of being published in reputable journals. in closing, i wish you all a successful workshop and i trust that the knowledge - sharing will be useful and rewarding to you personally and to your respective organizations and countries. i also hope that you will find time to enjoy suva. it may be challenging to listen to all the technical discussions planned, especially having such a conference in the festive month of december, so please do enjoy our fijian hospitality and may i also take this opportunity to wish you all a blessed christmas and a prosperous 2019. thank you!

reserve bank of fiji keynote address by the reserve bank of fiji governor, mr ariff ali south pacific central banking research conference, 12 december 2018, holiday inn, suva your excellency, ms amy crago, australian deputy high commissioner to fiji ; mr loi bakani, governor, bank of papua new guinea ; mr denton rarawa, governor, central bank of solomon islands ; deputy governors and fellow central bankers ; members of the griffith university faculty ; distinguished guests and participants ; ladies and gentlemen ; bula vinaka! it is indeed an honor for me to give the keynote address in this inaugural south pacific central banking research conference, co - hosted by griffith university and the central banks of papua new guinea, solomon islands, vanuatu and fiji. in fact, i am delighted that we central bankers in the pacific have taken this bold step to strengthen our research capacity, which is evident by the high - level attendance today, of representative central banks from the region. our being here also demonstrates our sincere appreciation of the commitment of griffith university and the australian government to assist in the research capacity of our pacific central banks. reserve bank of fiji i wish to congratulate dr pramendra sharma and the team from griffith university for convening this conference, an ultimate outcome of some years of dedicated work to highlight the research initiatives of our pacific central bankers and provide a platform for dialogue, information sharing and future research opportunities. deputy governor masitabua has welcomed us all last night so i do not wish to repeat his welcome, but i only wish to mention that the reserve bank of fiji is indeed privileged to co - host this inaugural conference and we look forward to fruitful deliberations in the next two days. collaboration with griffith university ladies and gentlemen, i wish to share at the outset a brief background of our journey with griffith university. the griffith - south pacific central banks ( spcbs ) partnership with the support of the australian government has come a long way, from one joint - working paper with the rbf in 2014 to almost 25 published and partially completed working papers amongst the four central banks represented here today. we have indeed proven ourselves as worthy partners with griffith university, and we can only expect bigger and better outcomes from this great partnership. i understand that one joint - paper under this collaboration has been published in the “ review of pacific basin financial markets and policies ”, a prestigious academic journal in singapore, and another has been accepted for publication in the “ journal of the asia