On March 26, 2021, Deputy Governor Nguyen Kim Anh of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) attended the virtual ASEAN Finance and Central Bank Deputies' Meeting (AFCDM). The SBV delegation was also comprised of representatives from the International Cooperation Department, the Department of Monetary Policy, the Department of Foreign Exchange Management, the Payment Department, the Department of Credit for Economic Sectors, the Department of Monetary & Financial Stability and the Banking Supervision Agency.
SBV Deputy Governor Nguyen Kim Anh attends the AFCDM
The Meeting spent much time discussing the cooperation in the ASEAN Finance-Banking Framework in 2020, and the overall integration process of the financial sector among ASEAN countries in ASEAN Vision 2025. In the context that cooperation activities have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, especially when the Working Groups have had to hold virtual meetings instead of direct meetings and technical workshops as before, the Finance and Central Bank Deputies made high evaluation of the cooperation outcomes achieved in 2020. These achievements will form the basis for ASEAN countries to evaluate and build a common integration plan for the region in the financial and banking sector within ASEAN Vision 2025 in an effective and practical manner.
Some outstanding outcomes achieved in the cooperation framework include: (i) Deployment of the bilateral QR code payment connections between some ASEAN countries, of which most recently, Thailand and Vietnam had successfully deployed the interconnection to provide trial service to customers in the form of switching - switching on March 22, 2021; (ii) Studying the current and future situation of ASEAN financial systems to review the guidelines for the ASEAN banking integration framework; (iii) A Report summarizing the policy experience of the Working Group on Capital Account Liberalization, giving an overview of the macroeconomic development, financial and capital flow measures of the countries in the region. In order to achieve the goal of comprehensive integration of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) in the ASEAN Vision 2025, the leaders of the ASEAN Central Banks and Finance Ministries recommended the Working Group continue to strengthen coordination and cooperation within the operational framework of the initiatives in order to achieve the overall goals.
The Delegates attending the virtual Meeting at different broadcast points (screenshot)
The SBV highly appreciated the role of the host country, Brunei Darussalam, and the efforts of all Working Groups in actively promoting the agreed initiatives and priorities, as well as in building a mechanism to share information on the monetary and banking operations management in response to the pandemic. The SBV also welcomed and supported the coordination mechanism of the banking and financial cooperation process towards building a sustainable development roadmap, which can be applied appropriately to the ASEAN countries' developmental contexts and levels.
The ASEAN Finance and Central Bank Deputies unanimously endorsed to report the important contents of financial-banking cooperation initiatives to the ASEAN Finance Ministers’ and Central Bank Governors’ Meeting for approval.
VA