Tunisia’s Central Bank Governor Outlines Five Concrete Proposals to Strengthen Arab Preparedness
The Governor of the Central Bank of Tunisia, Fethi Zouhair Nouri, spoke during his address at the fiftieth annual meeting of the Council of Governors of Arab central banks and monetary institutions, presenting five concrete proposals to bolster joint Arab preparedness.
According to the Central Bank of Tunisia (CBT), the Governor presented five measurable and trackable proposals, and called for a review of the progress made to be presented at the next meeting.
– Conduct a common Arab stress test, in order to measure the capacity of economies to withstand disruptions in trade corridors, rises in energy and food prices, and difficulties in accessing international financing.
– Establish an Arab network of swap lines and repos, to provide liquidity as needed, in coordination with the Arab Monetary Fund and under clearly defined conditions set before crises occur.
– Create a common Arab early warning observatory, tasked with monitoring risks related to energy, food, maritime transport, insurance, and capital flows, and enabling rapid information exchange.
– Expand the effective commercial use of the Arab payments system “Buna,” through measurable objectives that promote the use of the existing infrastructure.
– Establish a common Arab framework for protecting payment systems and ensuring their continuity, including an annual regional exercise to test the ability to respond to cyber and operational risks.
He also stressed, in the same context, that the success of these proposals depends on building security margins during periods of stability and on pre-positioning intervention instruments, stressing that “crises do not give us time to think; they test what we have thought before.”
