- based economy and is dealing with high levels of corporate debt and the complications of opening its capital account. on the monetary front, interest rates in the united states were recently increased for the first time in nine years, while the bank of bis central bankers ’ speeches japan unexpectedly moved one of its key interest rates into negative territory. in doing so, it joined the european central bank, the swiss national bank, the swedish riksbank and the danish central bank with negative rates. and in a number of countries, there is an expectation that yet further monetary easing will take place. it remains to be seen what all this means for us. the recent international data have been mixed but, at this stage, do not suggest that momentum in the global economy has been lost. the monetary easing abroad is a complication for us, as it tends to put downward pressure on the currencies where the easing is taking place and thus upward pressure on the australian dollar. more positively, lower oil prices – which primarily reflect increased supply capacity – are mostly good for global growth : they lower the cost of production for almost every firm in the global economy and put more money in the hands of consumers. the lower oil prices do, however, create financial strains for some economies and for some companies. so there are lot of cross - currents here that we are watching very carefully at the moment. i now want to move to the three challenges that i spoke about in 2010. expanding the supply side – productivity the first of these was expanding the supply side of the economy – or lifting our productivity. six years ago, the focus was on ensuring that the economy had sufficient productive capacity to avoid overheating during a period of strong demand flowing from the resources boom. today, the focus is a little different. while we have done a pretty good job of adjusting to our changed circumstances, the not - so - good news is that growth in real income per capita in australia has stalled ( graph 5 ). indeed, average real income is no higher today than it was in 2008. this follows a 17 - year period in which growth averaged a remarkable 3. 1 per cent per year. during this earlier period, we benefited from : ( i ) strong productivity growth in the 1990s ; ( ii ) a very large rise in our terms of trade ; and ( iii ) favourable demographics, which helped increase the share of the population in paid employment. in all three of these areas, recent outcomes have not been as kind. it is more

persons and the need for ensuring effective customer grievance redressal as also fair practice code. a banking ombudsman facility has been established covering all states and union territories for redressal of grievances against deficient banking services. the recently constituted banking codes and standards board of india is an important step in this regard which is expected to ensure that the banks formulate and adhere to their own comprehensive code of conduct for fair treatment of customers. additionally, constitution of a working group has been proposed in the latest policy to formulate a scheme for ensuring reasonableness of charges offered by banks on its various services. it is widely acknowledged that india is the repository of the best of human skills, especially in the financial sector. the technological competence of the indian workforce is perhaps presently part of folklore. the present levels of growth optimism about the economy suggest that india is expected to remain one of the important growth drivers of the global economy in the near future. the financial infrastructure and regulatory framework in the country are broadly on par with those prevailing internationally. we are working towards evolving a globally competitive banking sector, stressing on banking services relevant to our socio - economic conditions and contributing to both growth and stability.