delisle worrell : the frontier of practice in international criminal law opening remarks by dr delisle worrell, governor of the central bank of barbados, at the university of the west indies ’ ( uwi ) course in international crime, bridgetown, 17 january 2011. * * * this course is an example of what barbados needs to do in order to keep up with the evolving challenges of globalisation. globalisation is not new to us : the barbados we know today was born of the global outreach of an expansionist english nation, and its economy grew through international commerce in sugar, slaves and consumption goods. what is new is the nature of barbados ’ economic interface with the rest of the world. very little now remains of the sugar economy of the last three centuries. what we have today is an economy driven by international commerce in services, principally tourism services, with international business and financial services ( ibfs ) in second place. the international business and financial services sector is barbados ’ most recent foreign currency diversification initiative. our success in this activity is a result of an emphasis on quality – of regulation, of legislation, and of official administration. in order to maintain internationally acceptable quality we must constantly upgrade our performance in all these aspects – improving the adequacy of regulation, the appropriateness of legislation, and the processes and skills which enable government and private firms to provide an efficient professional service. the anti - money laundering ( aml ) framework, and the way we execute that framework, are crucial aspects of our quality control. we must constantly upgrade that framework to keep abreast of best international standards ; we must take measures to equip official entities with the knowledge and skills to execute their responsibilities in a transparent, even - handed and expeditious fashion. practitioners must fully understand and implement measures and procedures, which will ensure that their operations satisfy a demanding international standard, all the while offering their clients a service that is competitive in price and quality. this course put on by uwi will help all participants to remain current on the latest developments in international criminal law, so that we can enhance our standing among our competitors in the market for international business and financial services. the uwi is fortunate to have the benefit, as lecturer for this course, of one who has been writer, teacher and service provider in this field from its inception, in the person of bruce zagaris. bruce ’ s cv speaks for itself : he has a b. a., j.

have been asked to speak to you about the importance of being financially fit. but what is finance? the text books have a more elaborate way of defining finance but in common usage, the term finance simply means the management of large sums of money over time. for our purposes, we would define “ finance ” as simply the management of funds, not necessarily large. funds need to be managed because of two main factors : financial resources are scarce in relation to our aspirations and secondly because our receipt of funds and our need to incur expenditure do not normally coincide. by convention, most employees are paid monthly but their expenditure needs are spread across different times of the month. a parent may receive employment income today, but tuition fees for his or her ward may not have to be paid until next year. because considerable time can elapse between expenditure being incurred and the receipt of income, various institutions, including commercial banks, have emerged to assist in the financing of business during this interval. therefore time plays an important role in financial calculations. being financially fit simply means positioning oneself to deal with financial uncertainty. it means developing a series of financial habits that will make us better able to deal with unexpected expenses, rising cost of living and a decline or loss of income. we may draw an analogy with the human body, in the sense that one desires to be physically fit so that the body is better able to fight unexpected diseases. in short, sound financial management is simply a sensible way of spending and investing your money over a given period. to be financially fit, your money payments should be less than or at least equal to your income over that period. to achieve this you need to devise a personal plan that involves regular monitoring and evaluation. the planning process has a number of steps, usually five. you first need to assess your financial situation, then set financial goals, create an action plan to guide you towards those goals, take an identified course of action and monitor your progress over time. assessing your financial situation usually involves a listing of all your assets and liabilities. examples of your assets would include things like a car, a house, a bank account, and so on. your liabilities would include items like credit card debt, a bank loan, and so on. subtracting your total liabilities from your total assets will indicate your personal financial situation or your personal net worth at that point in time. finding out that your financial net worth is negative is like getting on a scale and finding out that you