Institute of Directors chairman praises forthcoming Corporate Governance conference

The chairman of the Institute of Directors Malta Branch, James J. Satariano, stated that Malta’s efforts since 1998 to improve corporate governance education for the local business community resulting in dozens of conferences, workshops, seminars and activities in the corporate governance field had culminated with the IoD being asked to organise the 20th European Corporate Governance Conference as part of the Maltese EU Presidency programme.

Mr Satariano said that it was an honour to have been selected as the leading corporate governance entity in the region and selected to organise the most important corporate governance event in Europe during 2017.

The conference is supported by the Ministry of Finance and will be opened by Finance Minister Prof. Edward Scicluna featuring a raft of world-class speakers, 30 speakers in all, adding up to the single most talented corpus of corporate governance experts ever to visit Malta. Mr Satariano revealed that the conference had been a year in the making and that the conference co-organisers, the European Confederation of Directors’ Associations led by Secretary General Béatrice Richez-Baum, had been invaluable in assisting to identify a top tier group of speakers.

The 20th European Corporate Governance Conference will be a full day event on Thursday, 4 May at Le Meridien in Balluta Bay.

The conference format is a series of five panels that explore longterm value creation; rebuilding trust with corporate governance; corporate governance and CSR; digitalization and innovation, and, a final panel The 20th European Corporate Governance Conference: A milestone for Corporate Governance history, which will feature contributions from Patrick Zurstrassen, Honorary Chair of ecoDa, founding member and former chairman of ILA, the Luxembourg Institute of Directors, David Devlin, chairman, European Corporate Governance Institute and Stephen Martin, director General, IoD UK.

Five leading international moderators have been recruited to ensure that every panel is dynamic and interacts effectively with the audience of over 200 leading CEOs, chairmen and directors from some of Europe’s top private sector companies, policymakers and NGOs.

The panels will be moderated by Edwin Ward, CEO at Ogilvy; Stephen Martin, director general, IoD UK; Susanne Knöfel, deputy head of Unit, DG Justice; Leena Linnainmaa, Chair, European Corporate Governance Codes Network and Elizabeth Krahulecz, director, head of EMEIA Regulatory & Public Policy Brussels Office, EY, who are the main sponsors for the conference. Paragon Europe from Malta are co-sponsors.

Some of the world-class speakers in the conference panels include Mark Goyder, CEO, Tomorrow’s Company; Florence Bindelle, secretary general, EuropeanIssuers; Marcello Bianchi, member of the Bureau of the OECD Corporate Governance Committee and deputy director general, Assonime; Kiyomi Saito, president, JBond Totan Securities Co., Ltd; Peter Swabey, Policy & Research director, ICSA Governance Institute; Claudia Kruse, High Level Expert Group on Sustainable Finance; Andrew Hobbs, Partner, EY; Guyliene Saucier, Board member, AC Chair, Wendel; Francesco Chiappetta, chairman of Company Law Working Group, Business Europe, Legal Counsel Pirelli; Irena Prijovic, Chair, ecoDa; Antoine Metzger, executive director, French Institute of Directors; Bernd Rummel, Policy Expert Regulation, European Banking Authority; Madi Sharma, European Economic and Social Committee Employers Group and Dr Elona Prroj, pastor, director of No Blood Feud, Yes to Life Foundation.

Mr Satariano said: “I am delighted that we were able to partner with ecoDa along with BusinessEurope and EuropeanIssuers to deliver such a strong corporate governance conference in Malta. IoD Malta has been at the forefront of corporate governance education under my leadership and the award of this conference to be staged in Malta on 4 May at Le Meridien gives me great satisfaction. I hope to see many local directors attending and getting the benefit of these leading experts on their home soil. It will also be a place where the business community can do business. I believe this is by far the most significant business conference held in Malta on this subject. As our economy grows and becomes more international this is exactly the kind of quality international business events that we have to stage.” For the programme and to register visit www.paragonevents.eu/corporate-governance.php or phone on 9920 7677, a limited number of conference-only places are left at the special offer price of €199+VAT on a first-come firstserved basis.