8th Annual IIEF Pension Policy Conference and Roundtable, 1 May 2008

Income insecurity in old age is likely to be one of the key causes of increased poverty in Asia and setting up systems to avert this crisis is central to the public policy goals of each country. The countries of Asia are remarkably similar in terms of economic strength, history, culture, legal and political structures, and difficulties of governance. Hence, lessons (from both success and failure) are highly portable from one country to another. For example, the issues in drafting pensions legislation in each of the countries can greatly benefit by a study of the texts of legislation, and a candid appraisal of its strengths and weaknesses, in other countries. This is reminiscent of the 'regional role models' which were effective in fostering faster learning of good economic policies in East Asia, as argued in the book 'The East Asian Miracle'. In the pensions field as well, The World Bank Pensions Primer and the OECD Pension Secretariat have been able to address the pension issues more efficiently.

IIEF proposed to foster a regional pensions community by bringing countries in the region onto a single platform to deliberate, discuss and work towards building pension systems in their respective countries. As a first step in this direction, IIEF hostied its regional pension policy and reform roundtable on 01 May 2008. This roundtable involved participation by policymakers, regulators and pension economists from Pakistan, Nepal, South Africa, Latin America, USA, Singapore and other countries.