Colombo, Sri Lanka (BBN) - The 65th Asia Pacific Rural and Agricultural Credit Association (APRACA) Executive Committee Meeting held at Cinamon Grand Hotel in Colombo on December 1-3 last.
Ajith Nivard Cabraal, Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, inaugurated the meeting formally while APRACA Chairman and Deputy Governor of the Bangladesh Bank (BB) Shitangshu Kumar Sur Chowdhury graced the event with welcome speech.
This year's Executive Committee meeting was gathered under theme and regional forum on ‘Adaptation and Mitigation of the Impact of Climate Change on Rural and Agricultural Finance’.
On December 1, APRACA Chairman Shitangshu Kumar Sur Chowdhury presented a paper on ‘The role of Central Bank to address the adverse effect of Climate change’ at the opening session of the meeting.
In his paper, the APRACA chairman highlighted about the green finance strategy adopted by the central bank of Bangladesh to cope with the challenges of climate change.
The delegates of the meeting were very curious to know about the green financing strategy and they highly praised the paper presented by the BB deputy governor.
The APRACA Executive Committee meeting conducted in several rounds of discussions and technical sessions with its Chairman Shitangshu Kumar Sur Chowdhury in the chair.
The committee discussed to adopt a project on ‘Addressing climate change effect’ in the region funded by the International Fund for Agricultural development (IFAD).
The chairman requested the committee that Bangladesh should be prioritized for adopting the IFAD project as the country is the most vulnerable country for climate change.
The committee assured the chairman that Bangladesh will be given priority for adopting the project. The Committee also decided to hold the next Executive Committee meeting in September 2015 in Iran.
The meeting was represented by fifty foreign delegates from Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Iran, Nepal, Thailand, Philippines, and local delegates in the field of Rural and Agricultural Financing in Asia- Pacific region.
Since its establishment in 1977, the APRACA has been promoting cooperation and facilitating mutual exchange of information and expertise in the field of agricultural and rural finance with the goal to alleviate poverty in the Asia Pacific region.
As on today a total of 70 institutions in 21 countries are affiliated with APRACA as its members.
BBN/SSR/AD-11Dec14-12:33 pm (BST)