domestic banks and 9 offshore banks. the sector was quite dynamic. by 2002, after some consolidation, there were 10 domestic banks and 12 offshore banks when there were also 221 offshore funds and around 19, 350 global business licence ( gbl ) companies. the offshore banks employed around 170 persons and their assets amounted to 94 % of our gdp. in 2005, we distinguished ourselves from other ofc ’ s by introducing a single banking licence. we adopted segmental reporting requiring the disclosure of financial information on two distinct segments of banking activity – segment b for banking business giving rise to “ foreign source income ”, and segment a for all other banking business. today, we have 21 banks operating in our jurisdiction, all involved to varying degrees in cross - border banking activities. some have extended their footprint beyond our shores, setting up operations in the region. our banking sector assets represent around 3 times our gdp. there were nearly 25, 000 gbl companies and their deposit base at the end of 2012 represented around 39 % of total banking deposits. there is a long way to go before we reach the size of other small ifc ’ s. our banks perform well and have proved to be very resilient. they have contributed in no small measure to the resilience of the mauritian economy. the robustness of our banking sector is itself the result of prudential measures adopted in a timely manner over the years. the global competitiveness report 2012 – 2013 provides a good indication of the health of the sector. it ranks the mauritian banking sector 15th out of 144 countries in terms of the soundness of banks, and 35th in terms of financial market development. in the ranking of the african banker magazine, seven mauritian banks figured among the top 100 banks in africa in 2012. this is no mean achievement if we consider that the mauritian gdp adds up to a grand total of one - fifth of one percent of african gdp. i have been focusing more on the central bank and its regulatees but the change was broad - based. the other financial and market regulators, namely the stock exchange of mauritius and the financial services commission, have also garnered international accolades. i am certainly not saying that there have not been some major tremors in our financial sector, because there have been. but these had nothing to do with the ongoing global financial and economic crisis. we had a major financial scandal in 2003, very much home - grown too. this was the infamous mcb / npf

enjoyed a prominent place in tax treaty planning of private equity players, multinationals, and global fund houses investing into india. we adopted high standards of rigorously - enforced regulation proposed by the financial action task force, the organisation for economic cooperation and development ( oecd ) and the international monetary fund ( imf ). we go beyond merely applying those international norms ; we are also committed and cooperative partners in compliance legislation. our efforts paid dividends – oecd placed us on its white list which means that our jurisdiction has substantially implemented the internationally - agreed tax standards. more recently, we have initiated consultations with the us revenue authority to become fatca - compliant. mauritius has also adopted tax information exchange protocols to allow foreign countries to investigate suspected tax evasion. as a small, isolated, island, we lost no opportunity to join regional economic groupings. when some of our needs were not met by existing bodies, we set about creating others, and two of these are actually headquartered in mauritius. mauritius joined the common market for eastern and southern africa ( comesa ), having been a founder - member of its precursor, the preferential trade area. we joined the southern african development community ( sadc ), at the same time that sadc opened its doors to post - apartheid south africa. we initiated the short process that culminated rapidly in the establishment of the indian ocean commission in 1982 and the bigger indian ocean rim association for regional cooperation in 1995. we are committed to be an active player in regional cooperation. the bank of mauritius serves as the settlement bank of the regional payments and settlement system of comesa. mauritius hosts afritac ( south ) – the 4th regional technical assistance centre of the imf in africa. the comesa fund and the africa training institute of the imf will soon start operations in mauritius. the day is not far when mauritius will obtain observer status in the eastern african community and asean. our vision to become a bridge between rising asia and africa is something that we have been patiently working on for several decades. a bis central bankers ’ speeches visible outcome is the fact that nearly half of our gbcs have been used as vehicles for investment in kenya, mozambique, zimbabwe and south africa. our banking sector little did we know how radically we were going to transform the financial landscape when we adopted in 1988 banking legislation to enable offshore banking. that was just 25 years ago. we then had 13 banks, all involved in domestic banking. by 1998, the numbers had changed to 10