03 March 2016

IASB: Supporting implementation through education

The IFRS Foundation’s Education Initiative was created to support the adoption and consistent application of IFRS Standards worldwide. At its centre is a project to encourage an ‘IFRS mindset’ in the global accounting and investor community.

Accounting standards are only as successful as their application in practice—even the best-written standards can be poorly applied. That is why one of the IFRS Foundation’s goals is to promote the adoption and consistent application of IFRS Standards around the world.

It has long been recognised that a comprehensive programme of education would be needed to support the development and implementation of IFRS Standards, and in 2005 the Foundation agreed to launch an Education Initiative. The Initiative began with an ambitious plan that set out a series of conferences, educational material, workshops and seminars to support jurisdictions and companies adopting and implementing IFRS Standards.

The events and resources proved extremely popular, with thousands attending and participating around the world. Now that more than 100 countries have adopted IFRS Standards, the Education Initiative’s focus has shifted to concentrate more on supporting consistent and rigorous application.

Underlying consistent application is the fundamental need for people from different cultures, who speak different languages, to understand fully the requirements of IFRS Standards. A challenge in this context is that countries have different accounting histories: some have an investor-based approach to accounting and corporate reporting, others have a system that is based on central planning, while others again have systems largely based on tax reporting. In many countries, the principle-based nature of the Standards is entirely unfamiliar.

With this in mind, the Education Initiative has focussed on four areas:

• building IFRS capacity through a Framework-based approach;
• support for those adopting and implementing IFRS Standards;
• support for those adopting and implementing the IFRS for SMEs; and
• investor-focussed IFRS education.

This is achieved through a huge range of educational events, workshops and publicationsand other resources. The most high-profile events are the major IFRS conferences held in different geographical regions each year.

Full article

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