MUSCAT – Talal Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman of the Talal Abu-Ghazaleh Organization (TAGorg), stressed at the GCC Banking Conference in Muscat that our most urgent of priorities as Arabs prevail in the reform, liberalization and modernization of our financial system, regardless of the extent of our openness to foreign competition. He also urged for special attention to be given towards the need for legislative action that would lay the foundation for new types of financial services and mediums.
He said that a stable financial system supported by healthy economic management and prudent regulations is a necessary requirement for economic growth.
These remarks were delivered by Abu-Ghazaleh yesterday at the opening speech of the Conference in his capacity as the Vice-Chair of the United Nations Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) Taskforce (UN ICT TF) for 2002, held in Muscat which concluded today under the sponsorship of H.M. Sultan Qaboos Bin Said. Participants included Arab central bank governors, investment banks and company heads in addition to a number of selected economic and financial experts.
Abu-Ghazaleh pointed to the importance of the current issues facing the Arab world, namely how to ensure the safety of our infrastructure and administrative system as we face future liberalization and regional and international integration.
He noted that the issues to be addressed such as the common currency, trade liberalization, financial transactions and company management are all related to globalization and its challenges.
He added that the Arab world now stands at a crossroads of several paths, and that we as Arabs have several options, except that the main factor for economic prosperity lies in the need for a banking sector that can support the economy as a whole.
He stressed that what we need is sound organization and management of our financial sector, particularly our banking sector.
Abu-Ghazaleh called for the organization of our Arab situations before embarking on opening our financial sector to foreign competition and pursuing greater regional integration. He added that liberalization urged by the World Trade Organization (WTO) will ultimately be essential for our economies as a whole, as it is essential to the safety of our financial sectors, including banks in the long term. However, we cannot rush into this without being adequately prepared, he noted, adding that currently there are structural and administrative problems in addition to issues that need to be dealt with by Arab legislators to reform and liberalize the internal operations of Arab banks.