BUSINESS CONTINUITY and crisis management are figuring prominently in future planning for the business sector. In May, Singapore staged an emergency exercise to test the readiness of its financial industry to deal with a terrorist attack, and to assess whether plans for business recovery and crisis management were effective.
Regulatory authorities and more than 170 financial institutions were involved. Exercise Raffles, as it was named, was the first in Asia and the biggest outside London, which ran a similar exercise last year.
It is part of a growing movement to adopt planning and emergency measures to deal with crisis management and business failure.
KPMG was closely involved in the operation.
'We wanted to see how different financial corporations could function in a disaster, whether they could communicate effectively and whether their continuity plans - if they had any - could cope,' said Alan Fung, a senior manager in KPMG's risk advisory services team.
The operation simulated a terrorist attack in the central business district. The exercise was deemed a success by the Association of Banks in Singapore and by regulators from Hong Kong. Will Hong Kong stage a similar exercise?
Thomas Wilson, director of KPMG risk advisory services, said: 'I believe the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, Securities and Futures Commission, the Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau took a keen interest in the exercises in London and Singapore and may well be thinking about something similar for Hong Kong.'