Ninth Meeting of the Payments Council Held 2/28/2000 Tweet The BiH National Payments Council, (NPC), held its' 9th meeting at the Central Bank of Bosnia & Herzegovina, (CBBH) in Sarajevo on Thursday the 24th of February. The meeting was chaired by the Governor of the CBBH, Mr. Peter Nicholl, and included representatives from the two entity ministries of finance, the two entity banking agencies, the federation payments bureau, commercial banks and the CBBH. The main item discussed at the meeting was a report from the Governor on decisions taken by the Governing Board of the CBBH the previous week on the future role of the CBBH in the reform and future operations of the payments and clearing systems in BiH. The CBBH has a statutory responsibility to "promote or to establish and maintain appropriate payment and settlement systems". Because of this, the CBBH board decided that the CBBH will have to play an active role in the new clearing system. The CBBH will investigate the establishment of a separate institution to determine the technical requirements of the future clearing system or systems in BiH and to tender for the supply of these services. The CBBH is to consult with the state and entity governments and the commercial banks and seek their support for the CBBH taking this active role. The discussion at the NPC meeting was the start of that process of consultation. All members of the council who spoke at the meeting supported the CBBH proposals. The heads of the two banking agencies also briefed the NPC on the progress in approving commercial banks to carry out domestic non-cash payments. Zlatko Barš, head of the FBiH Banking Agency, said that the first approvals would be granted by his agency the end of February.
