The newest and possibly most promising area of growth is sustainable finance where we aspire to support Asia’s transition to a low carbon economy. The task of reducing emissions is urgent, as pointed out by the most recent report of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. All sectors of the economy need to achieve progressive and deep emission reductions. Some $ trillion in infrastructure investments will be needed over the next decade to enable Southeast Asia’s transition towards sustainability [3] . In Singapore, we are developing strategies to build a comprehensive ecosystem for green and transition financing. We are aligning financing efforts with credible sectoral transition plans, that provide clarity about transition pathways and carbon emission targets. This in turn generates investor confidence and catalyses greater sustainable finance flows. We are promoting blended finance solutions, where targeted risk sharing by governments or multilateral development banks can crowd in private capital more effectively. We are stepping up efforts to enhance collection of emissions data, develop credible transition taxonomies, and implement consistent climate-related reporting and disclosure standards. One key initiative which MAS has embarked on with the industry is Project Greenprint, which comprises common utility platforms. These platforms will harness technology to address the financial sector’s sustainability data needs, and enable a more transparent, trusted and efficient ESG ecosystem that can catalyse green and sustainable finance. One of the most encouraging aspects of the strong growth of the financial sector is the number of good jobs that are being created.
Consequently, the optimal path of  BIS Review 46/2006  3  monetary policy may differ. Monetary independence gives us the capacity to react to asymmetric shocks and to limit their negative impact on the domestic economy. To sum up my arguments thus far, monetary independence allows Switzerland, first, to live with a comparatively low rate of inflation and, second, to reduce the impact of Switzerlandspecific shocks, which limits the volatility of Swiss inflation and growth. The third reason for monetary independence, which I would now like to turn to, is the protection of the Swiss interest rate advantage. Continuity of the interest rate advantage One major attraction of adopting the euro for countries with a record of high inflation was that national interest rates would drop in the run-up to the monetary union and converge to the German level, which was the lowest among the euro's founding members. Swiss interest rates, by contrast, have historically been lower, even lower than those in Germany. The reason why Switzerland enjoys the lowest interest rate levels in Europe has nothing to do with the appeal of our bank secrecy, as many believe. Switzerland is not a net importer of capital, but rather a major capital exporter. Traditionally, the Swiss economy displays a large excess of savings over investments. In 2005, our current account surplus represented 14% of GDP and Switzerland exported more capital than the whole euro area.