THE ROLE OF FINANCIAL REPORTING AND AUDITING
IN CREATING VIBRANT EMERGING MARKETS
By Ian Ball, Chief Executive Officer
International Federation of Accountants
5 th Islamic Financial Services Board Summit
“Financial Globalization and Islamic Financial Services”
Amman, Jordan – May 14, 2008
Thank you for inviting me to join this very distinguished panel.
Given that this is an audience not primarily made up of accountants, I thought it might be helpful
if I spent just a few minutes explaining who the International Federation of Accountants is, and
what we do. This will provide some context for the remarks that follow.
First, IFAC is an organization of professional accountancy institutes. We have 14 members and
associates in the Middle East, including two here in Jordan – the Jordanian Association of
Certified Public Accountants and the Arab Society of Certified Accountants. In total we have
157 members and associates spread across 123 countries, representing approximately 2  1/2  million
accountants.
As to what IFAC does, a primary function of the organization is to set professional standards.
Most importantly we set, through our International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board,
International Standards on Auditing (ISAs). We also establish a Code of Ethics for Professional
Accountants, which is the basis for codes of ethics of our members. The other two areas in which