OREANDA-NEWS. April 27, 2016. The International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Asia and Pacific Department (APD), in cooperation with the IMF - Singapore Regional Training Institute (STI), organized a workshop on April 19-20 in Colombo, Sri Lanka, for officials from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka on macro-financial linkages and diagnostics.

The workshop brought together officials from central banks and ministries of finance as well as IMF mission teams and resident representatives. Topics included operational aspects of macro-financial linkages, macro-financial vulnerability diagnostics, and macro-prudential policies. The aim is to build capacity in these areas.

IMF speakers included STI Director Julie Kozack, STI Deputy Director Mangal Goswami, APD Assistant Director Paul Cashin, and Asia and Pacific Division Chief Luis Breuer. IMF Alternate Executive Director, Mr. KwangHae Choi, also participated in the workshop and shared his experience.

Participants highlighted a number of key takeaways, including the importance of vigilant monitoring of credit growth and of close communication between relevant government agencies on macroeconomic and financial developments. They agreed that collection and analysis of relevant data were essential to ensuring maintenance of macro-financial stability.

"This workshop focused on South Asian countries and their distinctive features in a unique format which brought together IMF country teams and their official counterparts in an informal setting to consider macro-financial challenges facing all involved countries and help build relations between the IMF and its South Asian member countries", said Paul Cashin at the end of the workshop.

Background

The STI, founded in 1998 and located in Singapore, serves as the IMF’s regional training center for the Asia-Pacific region. It provides training on macroeconomic and financial management, and related legal and statistical issues, to government officials from 37 countries. Most training takes place in two-week seminars. The STI is jointly funded by the IMF, the Government of Singapore, and the Government of Japan, who together guide the training program. The Government of Australia also provides important support to the STI. Each year more than 800 officials participate in STI events, and another 100 attend national or regional courses held elsewhere in the region. Since 1998, the STI has provided training to more than 10,000 officials.