The Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB) has finalised its Strategic Performance Plan (SPP) for 2016-2018, which will continue its focus on prudential standards for the takaful, banking and Islamic capital market sectors with the overarching objective of ensuring the stability and resilience of the Islamic financial services industry.
The four strategic key results areas identified in the SPP 2016-2018 are the formulation and issuance of prudential standards and studies for the regulation of the Islamic financial services industry, facilitating the implementation of prudential standards and capacity development, increasing awareness and knowledge sharing, and enhancing cooperation with Islamic finance stakeholders.
In drafting the Plan, a detailed assessment of the global regulatory environment was conducted, highlighting the trajectory of the global regulatory agenda in the coming three years. More specifically, the assessment concentrated on the forthcoming work plans of the other international standard-setting organisations, namely the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS), International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) and International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) as well as the high-level objectives of the Financial Stability Board (FSB).
An examination was also carried out of the current state, and the prospective evolution, of the Islamic financial services industry in order to ascertain not only the global regulatory agenda’s implications for the industry, but also the unique opportunities and challenges that it faces.
The Plan was approved by the IFSB Council during a meeting in Jeddah in early December. The Council also appointed Mr Tarek Amer, Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt as IFSB Chairman for 2016.
E-learning portal launched to facilitate understanding of IFSB standards
The Council meeting also saw the launch of IFSB’s “Facilitating the Implementation of Standards” (FIS) E-Learning Portal, in line with its efforts to facilitate the implementation, and assist in the understanding, of the IFSB standards by member countries.
The FIS E-learning portal provides both IFSB members and non-member organisations a comprehensive learning and knowledge management suite with a number of interactive features that will assist in developing and enhancing knowledge as well as understanding of IFSB standards.
The e-modules will cover seven standards which have been transformed into a total of 14 E-Learning modules with a collective seat time of 15 hours. The IFSB Standards are IFSB-1 (Risk Management), IFSB-6 (Governance for Collective Investment Schemes), IFSB-10 (Shariah Governance System), IFSB-14 (Risk Management for Takaful), IFSB-15 (Revised Capital Adequacy), IFSB-16 (Revised Supervisory Review Process) and IFSB-17 (Core Principles for Islamic Finance Regulation).
The modules are available to both IFSB member and non-member organisations by subscription. A certain number of complimentary subscriptions are made available to organisations from the various categories of IFSB membership.
Kuala Lumpur-based IFSB is an international standard-setting organisation that promotes the soundness and stability of the Islamic financial services industry by issuing global prudential standards and guiding principles for the industry, broadly defined to include insurance, banking, and capital markets. There are currently 189 members consisting of 65 supervisory and regulatory authorities from 47 jurisdictions, as well as eight international inter-governmental organisations and 116 market players.