The Twelfth Senior Policy Seminar (SPS XII) sponsored by the Nairobi-based African Economic Research Consortium (AERC) took place in Mombasa, Kenya, on 22–24 March 2010. Policy makers and advisors from across Africa gathered for a sober reflection on one topical subject – Bank Regulatory Reforms in Africa. The seminar was opened by Hon. Wycliffe Ambetsa Oparanya, Minister for Planning and National Development and Professor Njuguna Ndung’u, Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya delivered the opening key note address to the conference of leading public policy makers, monetary and financial economists, and professional bankers.

The three days of intense discussions specifically focused on how to enhance bank competition and intermediation efficiency in the region. This region-wide meeting brought together 71 African economic policy makers and advisors drawn from the highest levels of government and representing 22 countries in the continent.

In the wake of the recent financial crisis that has created enormous regulatory risks, some changes in the content of banking regulation are crucial and any positive transformations are likely to produce encouraging results. The regulatory system in many African countries has evolved in the recent past, notably through progressively more detailed capital requirements and increasing demands that banking organizations enhance their own risk-management systems. However, with respect to the structure of the implementation of bank supervision and regulation, major changes are still in the works that will probably rearrange and consolidate financial oversight, and extend the powers of African central banks.

The Seminar Focus
AERC Senior Policy Seminars provide a structure for the honest exchange of experiences. The arrangement turns on syntheses of relevant research findings presented by senior scholars. Each session then features a brief summary of the presentation and a floor discussion by the policy makers themselves. The presenters for this year’s event were Prof. Victor Murinde, Head of Finance Subject Group, Birmingham Business School, University of Birmingham, UK; Dr. Kupukile Mlambo, African Development Bank, Tunis, Tunisia; Prof. Francis Mwega, Director, School of Economics, University of Nairobi, Kenya; Dr. Tianshu Zhao, University of Stirling, UK; Prof. Sunil Poshakwale, Cranfield University, UK; Prof. Hatem Salah, University of Manouba, Tunisia; and Dr. Abraham Mwenda, Managing Director, Zambia Development Bank.

Wrapping up the debates was a working session in which participants identified additional key areas of research for which findings they would like to utilize in policy formulation. This atmosphere generates spirited interaction among the participants and helps the policy makers to fine tune their own approaches as they apply the lessons and details of AERC-supported economic policy research from elsewhere on the continent. Besides this specific immediate result, the seminars improve the prospects for cooperative policy research between policy makers and researchers. The outcome of the consultations serves as input into AERC’s policy research agenda and helps with the identification of structures and methods intended to promote collaboration among policy makers and researchers, both within individual countries and across the continent.

Media Coverage
The seminar elicited significant interest from the local, regional and international media organizations and they covered this event very well. In Kenya they included The Daily Nation, Nation Television (NTV), The Standard, The East African and the Kenya Broadcasting Corporation (KBC) and FM stations like Kiss FM as well as Xinhua, a Chinese international media organization. At the meeting, journalists were also involved in long interviews with the key presenters and participants and these too were given extensive coverage in the local newspapers. Ahead of the meeting, a piece on the seminar and about AERC was published in The Daily Nation, The Standard and The East African. These are high-profile media outlets with high readership and circulation that their distribution covers the East African region. Other promotional materials prepared for the seminar included an AERC documentary which was running at the publications desk where AERC’s publications were displayed and some distributed to the participants.

For more information about this workshop or AERC, please contact:

The Executive Director
African Economic Research Consortium (AERC)
Middle East Bank Towers, 3rd Floor, Milimani Road
Tel: (254-20) 273-4150 / 273-4157
Fax: (254-20) 273-4173
exec.dir@aercafrica.org
communications@aercafrica.org