needs have traditionally been financed largely by government debt, asian governments are increasingly recognising that their own balance sheets cannot support the required scale of infrastructure development. thus, private sector participation is welcome in the region. 33. but public - private partnerships ( “ ppp ” ) in asia face not insignificant risks. ppp policies are not always well - defined, regulatory and legal systems are sometimes weak, and there are varying restrictions on foreign ownership. 34. robust legal frameworks and clear ppp policies need to be put in place. singapore has been supporting such efforts in partnership with multilateral agencies such as the world bank. 35. in 2009, we established the world bank - singapore urban hub to bring together singapore ’ s public agencies, research institutes, and private sector players to share experiences with developing countries, especially in areas such as water and waste management, land use planning, and urban development. to expand the urban hub ’ s infrastructure finance advisory work, an infrastructure finance centre of excellence ( ifcoe ) was launched last year. 36. the urban hub has also partnered the singapore cooperation enterprise – a platform that leverages on the public sector expertise of singapore. together, they have implemented six projects in indonesia, vietnam, china and mongolia. this includes helping these governments develop a regulatory and financing framework to prepare ppp projects for private sector investment. bis central bankers ’ speeches 37. regional governments have also introduced schemes to encourage private sector investment. for example, the indonesian ministry of finance has worked with the world bank to set up the indonesia infrastructure guarantee fund. this fund provides guarantees to the private sector against risks arising from government actions, so as to improve the creditworthiness and quality of ppp infrastructure projects. 38. a critical success factor for achieving asia ’ s infrastructure investment potential is a well - developed financial sector. asia needs financial markets that are deep enough to effectively intermediate its considerable savings pool and broad enough to provide a range of suitable instruments for risk mitigation. although asean has made progress on these fronts since the 1997 crisis, more needs to be done. these include strengthening legal and regulatory frameworks, increasing market access, harmonising cross border regulations, and raising the level of corporate governance. 39. asean has set in motion several initiatives. it has drawn up a scorecard to identify gaps in the development of bond markets. its capital markets regulators are working on initiatives to harmonise domestic laws, regulations, and practices. it has introduced the asean plus standards, which are disclosure

corporate governance practices, but we must press on with continual improvements. as regulators, professional bodies, investors, academics and the media, we each have a role – let us work closely together in this journey. finally, while my comments have focused mainly on singapore, it is heartening that we have such a deep and diverse group of investors and practitioners from around the region. i am sure there will be much that we can learn from each other, and i hope that deep and frequent interactions like this catalyse new ideas and spur us all to do better. i wish you a fruitful conference. thank you.