CIBAFI technical workshops schedule announced

Manama, Aug. 23 (BNA): The General Council for Islamic Banks and Financial Institutions (CIBAFI), has announced the schedule of its Technical Workshops on Product Development for Islamic Financial Institutions (IFIs) starting August 30 to be organized in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Sudan. These Technical Workshops aim to equip the Islamic banking staff to help industry tackle the need for developing their technical expertise in taking the industry forward. As revealed in CIBAFI’s Global Islamic Bankers' Survey 2015, human resources and talent development are among the main priorities for Islamic financial institutions as they face peculiar challenges in developing staff and other human capacity who are sufficiently trained in industry’s leading practices, while at the same time proficient in the specific products and operational needs of the industry. The first of this series of Technical Workshops will be held in Bahrain from August 30 to September 1. This will be followed by the workshop hosted by Institute of Finance, Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA) in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia from 19 - 21 October 2016. The final workshop of this series will be hosted by Central Bank of Sudan and will be held in Khartoum, Sudan on December 6-8. These Technical Workshops are targeted towards middle-level staff of Islamic banks and financial institutions including officers from the departments of Sharia-compliant product development, risk management, legal and others. The three-day Technical Workshops aim to provide participants with hands on technical knowledge and skills pertaining to product development, with a focus on Islamic financial services and enable participants to understand the mechanisms, process, and obstacles in product development. These workshops also aim to equip the Islamic banking staff to help industry tackle the need for developing innovative product offerings for the Islamic banking industry, and strengthen their know-how on most important aspects of the industry. Participants will be exposed to seamlessly integrated theory with practice programme, which seeks to engage participants in discussions relating to the Sharia compliance concepts in the context of products development. The Technical Workshops will focus on the development of Islamic products and services and utilise real industry case studies to debate the issues. The initiative is aligned with CIBAFI’s fourth Strategic Objective of Professional Development, and in particular CIBAFI’s endeavor to enhance capacity building in the Islamic Financial Services Industry (IFSI). CIBAFI, as the ‘voice’ of the industry, aims to provide platforms such as these to develop human capital and bring industry professionals together to encourage dialogue and enhance knowledge sharing on most relevant matters of the IFSI.