The Pakistan-China Institute (PCI) and the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to work together to promote a better understanding amongst accounting professionals about issues related to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and the One Belt One Road (OBOR).
Pakistan’s professional accountants were increasingly being drawn into conversations about economic and political events such as CPEC—the single largest foreign direct investment in Pakistan’s history. Finance professionals who base their work on risk assessment are now faced with factoring CPEC outcomes into finance strategies and governance strategies, especially if one is working in a directly impacted public sector enterprise.
The finance profession wants to play a role in making this game changer into a sustainable success and that is why ACCA Pakistan is partnering with the Pakistan-China Institute to provide an intellectual partnership to share insights and knowledge with the ACCA and PCI communities, and bring the two communities closer via networking events, policy reports and dialogue. ACCA Pakistan head Sajjad Aslam said that ACCA has been listening to numerous stakeholder conversations globally about the OBOR project.
“Our students and members study and work in countries, which are directly and indirectly impacted by OBOR, and the string of pearls maritime route. In keeping with our research and insights, ACCA would like to gain a better understanding of how the various OBOR projects may affect the work of professional accountants, including finance leaders, who are formulating finance strategies and developing plans for their organisations,” he said.
He also said that taking a proactive attitude to stakeholder education and dialogue initiation, “we had reached out to the Pakistan-China Institute as the original thought leader on CPEC,” adding that this partnership with PCI provides a great opportunity for creating a learning base that will benefit ACCA members and students in both countries, as well forging greater relations with Chinese and Pakistani business finance leaders.
Also in attendance for the MoU signing, which took place in Islamabad yesterday, were ACCA Council Member Phoebe Hao Yu, ACCA Chief Executive Helen Brand and Council Member Ayla Majid. Phoebe Yu, speaking on the occasion, said “regional integration via closer trading and commerce routes will be of huge importance to drive future China economic and global growth. ACCA members and students in both China and Pakistan can form a closer community for learning and sharing corporate and business culture, which will prove valuable to sustain CPEC outcomes.”
Speaking on the occasion, Helen Brand said, “ACCA has operations in over 100 countries globally, and 25 of these countries sit directly on the OBOR footprint in the Asia Pacific and MENASA region alone, including China, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and the Middle East. We have 35 offices, in 22 out of the 65 countries along OBOR; these two regions are the fastest growing networks of members, students, employers and learning partners. As you can see, the ACCA world is very much aligned to that of OBOR.”
She added, “The diversity of our membership base, their youth, mobility and professional standards of financial management expertise, underpinned by strong ethics, mean that our members are an ideal human resource in a connected and highly complex commercially driven environment. The people-to-people contact, which the CPEC and the wider OBOR envisages, resonates strongly with ACCA’s value of diversity.”
Parliamentary Committee on CPEC Chairman Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed remarked, “This MoU is being signed on the onset of the Chinese Year of the Rooster—which symbolises waking up for the new dawn—and PCI and ACCA are initiating this collaboration with hard work and zeal.”