National Workshop on Regulatory Sandbox on Central Bank Digital Currency

Malé, Maldives
ESCAP

By invitation only

Frontier technologies carry a promise to fast track the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through supporting innovative, forward-looking policies and solutions. There are, however, risks and complexities of digital technologies that come along with those opportunities, including the widening digital divide as well as policy and regulatory challenges.

In recent years, relatively new approaches of policy experimentation and regulatory sandboxes have emerged among countries and have proven to be effective in creating a more conducive space where governments, in partnerships with relevant stakeholders, can experiment and trial with digital technologies and innovations at the edge or outside of the existing policy space and regulatory framework.

Maldives is one of the three target countries (Bangladesh, Kazakhstan and Maldives) of the project entitled “Frontier Technology Policy Experimentation and Regulatory Sandboxes for Sustainable Development” being implemented jointly by ESCAP, Maldives and other stakeholders. Maldives identified ‘Central Bank Digital Currency’ as the project’s focus area following a national consultation on 7 September 2021 (URL: https://www.unescap.org/events/2021/national-consultation-frontier-tech…). As a follow-up to the implementation of the project for Maldives, UN DESA, ESCAP, the Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA), and the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Technology (MECCT) are co-organising a national workshop with relevant domestic stakeholders.

The key objectives of the workshop are to engage and enhance awareness of relevant domestic stakeholders; discuss and exchange ideas on the opportunities of “Central Bank Digital Currency” for sustainable development; and develop the next course of actions including setting up a regulatory sandbox framework for Central Bank Digital Currency and other frontier technologies.

For further information, please contact the ICT and Development Section, ICT and Disaster Risk Reduction Division, ESCAP, e-mail: [email protected].