allocates financial resources depends upon your doing it well. it is a heavy responsibility. but the official community equally has a responsibility to help in so far as it can. and we can help, i think, in three main ways. the first is through transparency in our macro - economic policies - in the provision of reliable data, and through clarity in both our monetary and fiscal objectives, in our analysis and in our decision - making, so that you are not exposed to wholly unpredictable behaviour and can make your own considered judgements as to how far our policies are likely to succeed. your judgements, of course, can in turn have an important bearing on our policy decisions. secondly we can help in providing robust infrastructures - and i have in mind not just the financial infrastructure, though sound financial systems are clearly hugely important, but much more widely the legal framework, accounting and disclosure standards, and governance structures, for example, as they apply throughout the private sector, so that again you can base your assessment of corporate credits on a fuller understanding of the risks. we have been making very considerable efforts in different international fora in recent years to establish codes and standards of best practice in all these areas which can be universally applied, but i don't need to remind you how far we all still have to go. and thirdly, in relation to sovereign debt, i think that the international community could, and should, do more to clarify the scale of official support that a country running into difficulties might reasonably look for, and the kind of conditions that it might expect to apply. as things stand at present neither the debtor countries nor their private sector creditors have much idea what to expect, and may be tempted to assume that they will be bailed out if things go wrong. greater clarity could help to persuade borrowers to face up to hard policy choices earlier, before things get out of hand, and enable the creditors to make a more objective assessment of the risks. i think, too, that it would be helpful if we could at least agree on best practice guidelines for a debtor country's handling of a situation in which it could not immediately honour its obligations. that, too, could help creditors better understand the risks that they are taking on. but while the official community can help in these ways, in the final analysis the buck stops with you, the investors. i find it encouraging that so many of you are attending this conference, at which many of the relevant risks, and

yandraduth googoolye : e - payment developments in mauritius keynote address by mr yandraduth googoolye, first deputy governor of the bank of mauritius, at a visa briefing on the economic benefits of e - payments, port louis, 8 october 2008. * * * good morning i am indeed glad to be here to share a few thoughts on the importance of electronic payment system for economic development. there is no doubt that the advent of electronic payment system has resulted in numerous benefits for consumers and suppliers in both developed and developing economies. empirically, it has been established that increased use of credit cards is positively co - related with economic growth and exports. in mauritius, the growth of e - payments, which cover the entire spectrum of use of the electronic media for settling transactions and would hence include among others, credit and debit cards, internet banking and mobile banking, has been tremendous. we, thus, had 382 atms in july 2008 as against 334 a year before and 293 in june 2005. the number of transactions using credit and debit cards went up from 3 million in june 2007 to 3. 7 million in july 2008 while the aggregate value of monthly transactions increased from about rs 5 billion to rs 6. 8 billion during this period. more than 1. 1 million credit and debit cards were in circulation at the end of july 2008, an average of more than one card per head of adult population. a few banks are already offering internet banking facilities while some others are in various stages of doing so. it is heartening to note that the use of electronic media is spreading to many other types of transactions rather than being confined to purchase of goods and services at points of sale, withdrawal of cash and to put through transactions on the b2c portals. thus, for instance, this year mra allowed on line payment of taxes through select banks which, coupled with efiling of tax returns, is a major step forward. the central bank has the responsibility of maintaining the stability of the payments and financial system. the bank of mauritius operates and manages mauritius automated clearing and settlement system which is the communication backbone for inter - bank settlements and for the real time gross settlement. we also play an enabling role by adopting a positive, though cautious, approach to development of e - payments in the country. the orderly development of any segment of financial sector would require sound regulatory framework. the present approach requires financial institutions under its purview to seek the bank ’ s