During the meeting, CEF Director Jana Repanšek highlighted the CEF’s progress toward our vision to inspire public officials, both individuals and teams, in shaping institutional governance that drives successful economies and fair societies. She emphasized that the CEF's approach to capacity development focuses on both technical and non-technical skills, believing that this multifaceted approach is crucial for creating sustainable, inclusive, and effective policies and practices.

“We scaled up our focus on team dynamics and organizational development. We sharpened our communication skills and improved as facilitators of progressive learning. This empowered us to offer high-quality learning experiences to our participants and support them, their teams, and their institutions in reaching their potential. To this end, we also published our methodology on how public institutions can become learning organizations,” explained Ms. Repanšek. As an example, she shared information on a recently co-developed project with the National Bank of Moldova, which aims to support their transformation into a learning organization through individual, team, and institutional capacity development.

Ms. Repanšek also thanked governing board members for their guidance and support in helping us shape the CEF learning and knowledge sharing program into valuable learning experiences for public officials in South East Europe and beyond. “We remain committed to innovating and adapting our program to meet the learning needs of the region, and to unite public officials in our journey of regional knowledge sharing and professional development, as we are convinced of our common future in united Europe,” noted Ms. Repanšek.

“I would like to wish the Governor of the Central Bank of Moldova a successful chairing and to the CEF and all its members and partners many accomplishments in achieving our common goals in the upcoming year,” said Governor Sejko. With these words, Governor Sejko passed the CEF key, symbolizing knowledge and success, along with the booklet that contains messages from past Governing Board chairs to their successors, to the newly appointed chair of the CEF Governing Board, Mr. Octavian Armașu, the Governor of the National Bank of Moldova.

In addition to the Governing Board meeting, members also participated in a high-level conference on Green Finance in South East Europe – Developing Capacities and Taxonomy organized by the CEF and Bank of Albania, with the support of Banka Slovenije. Together with the Minister of Finance and Economy of Albania, Ms. Delina Ibrahimaj, Governor Sejko, and Ms. Repanšek opened the conference. After Vice Governor Tina Žumer from Banka Slovenije set the stage for the discussion, the conference participants discussed the initial actions taken, the challenges faced, and their vision for the way forward in promoting green finance. The overarching themes of the discussion revolved around raising awareness of climate change risks and opportunities, building partnerships and networks for learning and cooperation, developing strategies and roadmaps needed to prepare key stakeholders for more ambitious actions, and expected stricter environmental, social, and governance standards. The goal of the conference was to contribute to making Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050.

At the conference, the CEF also convened for the first time in person representatives of the expert group of senior Banking Regulators and Supervisors (BRS) in South East Europe, which the CEF co-established in May 2022. As part of the conference discussion, BRS expert group members shed light on practical experience and challenges in addressing and integrating green finance principles in the scope of prudential supervision and financial stability. In parallel to the Governing Board meeting, the BRS expert group members continued the conference discussion, reflecting on opportunities for future peer learning, knowledge sharing, and cooperation in the field of green finance, as part of the CEF program or initiatives of other relevant networks and partners.