KARACHI July 17: A two-day South Asian Federation of Accountants (SAFA) conference was held in Dhaka in which 600 delegates from Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal participated.

A press release issued by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Pakistan (ICAP) on Monday noted that the conference was jointly organised on the 15th and 16th of July by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bangladesh (ICAB) and the Institute of Cost and Management Accountants of Bangladesh (ICMAB).

The theme of the conference was “Resource Mobilisation and Management of Economic Growth.” The ICAP press release stated: “Representatives of the accounting bodies of the Saarc countries presented papers taking stock of what resources South Asia could create in order to build new frontiers of development”. It said that the speakers emphasised that poverty, which had been sacrilege of this continent for many countries must be left behind and in its place, an era of prosperity and abundance must be created.

ICAP president Syed Mohammad Shabbar Zaidi presented a paper on “Development of Social Sectors Science, Technology and Entrepreneurship”.

He said 85pc of the business firms represent small and medium enterprises (SMEs) but an accounting system for those has not been developed. Shabbar emphasised the need to encourage private initiative in the development of social sector and called for giving private initiative more responsibility, space and freedom.

Others who spoke on the occasion included SAFA President Sunil Goyal; chairman of the conference committee Jamal Uddin Ahmad; President of ICAB ASM Nayeem and president of ICMAB Satipati Moitra.