Islamic Development Bank, Bloomberg LP launch financial education programme across 9 countries

The Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) and Bloomberg LP will partner to deliver a financial education programme for university students in nine countries across the Middle East, Africa and Asia.

The nine IsDB member countries involved in the programme are Bangladesh, Egypt, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Malaysia, Nigeria, Oman, Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan.

IsDB and Bloomberg will announce participating universities over the coming months, IsDB said, according to official news agency WAM.

The programme will leverage the Bloomberg Terminal to support the Islamic finance sector and empower students in universities with the required financial skills. The programme will support the sector’s long-term growth through specialised training on market infrastructure and areas like transparency, connectivity and compliance across central banks and regulators.

The programme includes the IsDB-Bloomberg certification, composed of a series of challenges and modules designed for the selected countries and delivered by Bloomberg market specialists. These include the Bloomberg Islamic Finance module to introduce students to Islamic finance principles and the relevant tools available on the Bloomberg Terminal.

Bloomberg LP will also offer the Bloomberg Market Concept course (BMC), which offers an interactive introduction to the financial markets, covering economic indicators, currencies, fixed income, equities, portfolio management, stock options, and commodities.

Students will receive the Bloomberg Market Concept certificate after completing the seven-course modules. Top performing students will be recommended for internship opportunities at IsDB, a statement said.

Dr. Bandar Hajjar, president of IsDB, said: “The launch of the capacity and skills building programme with Bloomberg is important to IsDB Group to prepare young people for 21st-century jobs and the labour market requirements. We hope this programme will contribute to providing a number of our member countries with a group of young people capable of bringing about a qualitative leap in increasing productivity and enhancing competitiveness in some vital and pioneering productive sectors in these countries.”

Through this partnership, the two parties will seek to develop tailored financial literacy and education programmes across the selected IsDB member countries in a manner consistent with the Fourth Industrial Revolution’s applications to build a new generation of skilled workers, he added.