September 2017

22Sep

Ukraine Pension Reform Changes Worry World Bank, IMF

The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are concerned about amendments to pending pension reform legislation needed to unlock further funding under a $17.5 billion (£12.92 billion) IMF programme, the World Bank's Ukraine director said on Friday. A draft law to put the buckling pension system on a sustainable footing passed a first reading in parliament in July, but the bill has been modified with scores of amendments ahead of a second round of voting. "The revised draft law presented...

September 22, 2017
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22Sep

Biggest Africa Fund Manager May See Funds Pulled by Unions

Africa’s biggest fund manager may be dumped by a labor federation representing 230,000 South African state workers because it’s concerned that the funds of its members may be used to bail out mismanaged state-owned companies. The Federation of Unions of South Africa, the country’s second-largest labor union grouping, is considering replacing the state-owned Public Investment Corp. with privately owned fund managers to oversee the pension funds of the state workers, including nurses and teachers, that it represents. “There is nothing in...

September 22, 2017
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22Sep

Ireland. Government to introduce auto-enrolment pension scheme for all workers

Leo Varadkar used a speech to the employer's group IBEC tonight to announce the centrepiece of an upcoming national pension plan. He told the audience that two-thirds of private sector workers in Ireland have no pension, warning that the time bomb must be addressed now. “This issue has been long-fingered for too long and now that the economy is recovering strongly we must act decisively and we will publish a five year road-map for pension reform before the end of the...

September 22, 2017
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21Sep

UK watchdog to investigate conflicts of interest among pension fund advisers

Britain's competitions watchdog will look into the advice given by consultants to pension schemes and other institutions managing over 1.6 trillion pounds ($2.2 trillion) of funds, to see if there are conflicts of interest, it said on Thursday. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) will assess whether investment consultants offer a poor level of service and whether difficulties comparing and switching consultants provide little incentive for them to compete for customers. In addition, it will investigate if there are barriers to...

September 21, 2017
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21Sep

Kazakh pension scandals stir criticism of government

Media trainer Anara Kuandikova, 29, is typical of the generation of post-independence professionals who have most to lose if anything goes wrong with oil-rich Kazakhstan's scandal-struck Unified Pension Fund. "I still see my pension contributions as a real investment in my future," said Kuandikova, who works in Astana and pays a tenth of her $600 monthly salary -- one-and-a-half times the national average wage -- into the fund. "But the more negative information you hear, the more you begin to...

September 21, 2017
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20Sep

El Salvador: Protests against pension fund ‘monopolies’

Representatives of various social organizations and unions in El Salvador rejected the “monopoly” Pension Fund Administrators (AFP) and the management of profits created by workers’ savings. Around 50 people protested the morning of September 18 at the headquarters of one of only two AFPs in the Central American country. Dionisio Flores, representative of the union of state-run National Aqueduct and Sewerage Administration, declared that they stand “against a monopoly in which private enterprise has taken over workers’ funds.” Salvadorean President Salvador...

September 20, 2017
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20Sep

Hong Kong needs to reform pension fund system: PwC report

Hong Kong's pension fund, Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF), a system which covers 73 percent of the employed population in Hong Kong, needs to address problems to manage risks, a PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report said on Tuesday. The problems include high fees, unattractive returns, a reliance on paper-based processing, and a blanket approach that offers few incentives for members to pay more into their MPF portfolios, said PwC's Review of Hong Kong's MPF System: Recommendations for Key Reforms. Hong Kong is not immune...

September 20, 2017
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20Sep

ASEAN Conference to help address issues and challenges of ageing in the region

The 1st ASEAN Conference on Healthy Ageing is set to take place this 10th-12th October in Sarawak, Malaysia. Themed Ageing - Challenges, Successes and the Journey Ahead, the conference is aimed to help address the issues and challenges of rapidly ageing populations in the region. The conference is organised by the Malaysian Healthy Ageing Society (MHAS) in collaboration with the Sarawak Convention Bureau. Clinicians from various disciplines, allied health professionals, the legal fraternity, financial institutions, insurers, pharmaceutical companies, policy makers,...

September 20, 2017
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20Sep

Ireland. Calls on government to abandon increasing the pension age to 70

Speaking in response to ESRI recommendations Deputy Kenny said: “In 2014 the government caused huge distress people by increasing the pension age from 65 to 66.  People expecting to receive their state pension at retirement were forced into Jobseekers' payments. “It’s outrageous for this government to suggest that working people and especially those doing physical work like builders and farmers must now continue working for a further four years before they can receive the pension to which they have contributed...

September 20, 2017
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19Sep

How robots can save an ageing world

Many doomsayers have argued that an ageing population poses a huge threat to economic growth. They believe that rich countries in the West are headed towards secular stagnation as the size of their young, working-age population shrinks rapidly due to low fertility rates. On the other hand, countries like China and India are predicted to enjoy much higher economic growth in the coming decades as more young people get added to their workforce due to favourable demographics. The primary...

September 19, 2017
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