Existing communication practices on monetary policy and financial stability

9. Since a June 2021 policy regime change, the CBvS has faced challenges in effectively communicating its policies and actions to the market and the public. These challenges include a lack of clarity and transparency in monetary policy decision-making and subsequent communications, insufficient engagement with stakeholders, and difficulties in conveying the rationale behind monetary policy decisions. Based on the mission’s findings in discussions with external observers and stakeholders, these issues have tended to lead to misunderstandings and misinterpretations, which might undermine the effectiveness of the CBvS’s policies and hurt the central bank’s credibility.

10. The CBvS has communicated sparingly and irregularly, particularly regarding monetary policy. This lack of standard, consistent communication about policy objectives and conduct has shifted public attention toward technical details of open market operations and backward-looking economic reports, rather than fostering frequent and interactive engagement with stakeholders on achieving its price stability objective. Instead, the CBvS has adopted a reactive approach, addressing criticism or misinterpretations rather than proactively shaping public perceptions and expectations about its inflation-oriented policies. Moreover, the CBvS has yet to implement the communication tools widely considered essential for modern central banks. There are no press releases on the outcomes of periodic monetary policy reviews, no regular press conferences, and no focused reports that could lay the groundwork for a future Monetary Policy Report (MPR).

11. The CBvS has improved its financial stability-related internal communication and processes since 2022. The previous CARTAC TA focused on the FSR conducted in 2022 also reviewed related processes, including internal and external communication. Based on the recommendations from that TA mission, the CBvS has significantly enhanced these processes.

12. A regular practice of preparing a detailed production plan for the FSR was established. The FSR is produced on an annual basis. Although the first report was published in 2015, it was discontinued, and regular annual releases resumed in 2021. In line with the recommendations from the 2022 CARTAC TA mission, the Financial Stability Department created a detailed production plan adopted by all relevant department heads contributing to the report. This plan includes all steps during the production cycle, specific dates/deadlines, and responsible persons covering data, drafts of different chapters/contributions, review/comments, etc.

13. The FSR’s key issues and focus are discussed with all relevant departments before and during the report drafting. The Financial Stability Department organizes and leads initial meetings with all contributors, including other departments, to discuss the key topics and risks to be included in the report. This discussion is based on the latest financial stability update prepared by the Financial Stability Department on quarterly basis.

14. Additionally, a meeting with all contributors is organized midway through the drafting process to discuss the identified risks for the financial sector in more detail. This meeting aims to implement a coherent risk story with a macrofinancial narrative, connecting different chapters in the report. It also supports synergies between the work on various topics across the drafting team.

Enhancing overall communication framework and strategy

15. The CBvS would benefit from developing an explicit strategic framework for external communication on both monetary policy and financial stability. This specific Strategy for Monetary Policy and Financial Stability Communication would ideally fit as a subcomponent of the overall Strategy⁵ of the central bank covering also internal communication and processes. It would articulate specific goals, messages, tools, and audiences for monetary policy and financial stability communication, and its effectiveness would be systematically evaluated. The outline of a recommended strategic framework for monetary policy is provided in Annex I.

16. The Strategy guiding policy external communication would predominantly aim to inform the public about the primacy of the CBvS’s price stability objective as well as its secondary financial stability aim. A key goal would be to broaden the understanding of the CBvS’s status, mandate, and objective as a central bank committed to pursuing and maintaining price and financial stability.⁶ On monetary policy, steering the markets’ and public’s inflation expectations to the CBvS’s definition of price stability would be a major communication goal. To be able to effectively and actively influence expectations, the CBvS needs to specify and agree, at the Board level, on its definition of price stability. This is particularly important in view of Suriname’s history of a high, double-digit inflation at levels around 50% before a gradual decline through 2024 to single digit levels.⁷

17. The mission team recommends the CBvS authorities to go public with their preferred price stability definition as a “single-digit inflation level”. The mission advised the authority to focus on this and agree on this, or similar, verbal definition that would be institutionally adopted and repeated in public pronouncements, in order to help anchor inflation expectations at a low level suitable for Surinamese economy. However, the mission acknowledges that defining and publicly announcing a “verbal definition” of price stability within a money targeting framework (MTF) poses challenges. Policymakers under an MTF would need to manage the risk of public confusion between the money target and the price stability objective, since communicating a direct link between a targeted money growth and price stability has historically proven difficult in many counties. Additionally, the CBvS has opted for an MTF due to limited scope for “fine-tuning” inflation outcomes. Communicating an overly precise or narrow definition of price stability could raise credibility risks over time. To address these challenges, the mission suggested resorting to a verbal definition (i.e., “inflation in single digits”), presenting an option to be both specific enough and maintaining room for maneuver, while considering how other central banks with MTFs have communicated their price stability objectives. Such examples for monetary targeting central banks range from a very vague definition of price stability (as in the case of Seychelles⁸, classified by the IMF as monetary aggregate targeting central bank with a floating exchange rate⁹, which has communicated merely about its primary objective as a further undefined “price stability”), to Mongolia¹⁰, a former monetary aggregate targeting central bank which used to refer to its price stability objective as “ensuring sustained low levels of inflation”. Mongolia has since been reclassified as an inflation targeting central bank.

18. The Strategy should be adopted as an CBvS document and approved by the Board. Apart from setting the strategic communication goals, the document would seek to formulate the main strategic communication messages aiming to achieve the specified goals, break down target stakeholder groups, and develop tactics, tools, and techniques for reaching out to each target group individually (See Table 1 for the Overview of the Main Monetary Policy Communication Tools). The Strategy would have the CBvS systematically employ a wide variety of communication tools to transmit its messages to a wide array of audiences, including the CBvS staff. The central bank’s employees need to be aware of policy aims and actions and understand the policy conduct to effectively serve as informal ambassadors spreading the messages in the right tone and substance.

19. Adopting the “standard package” of monetary policy communication practices is crucial for enhancing market confidence and build public trust in the CBvS’s ability to deliver price stability. While many of the mission-recommended communication practices are typically pursued by inflation-targeting central banks, adopting the “minimum standard” is equally relevant for a money-targeting central bank such as the CBvS. The authorities’ preference to continue modernizing their monetary policy framework with a floating exchange rate makes the adoption of an “inflation-targeting-like” communication strategy and practices even more topical. Among the 61 countries with de facto floating exchange rate arrangements— floating or free floating—inflation targeting (with 31 countries) is the predominant monetary anchor while in the rest of the countries it varies among monetary aggregates (6, including Suriname) and “other” (24, including the 20 European Economic and Monetary Union countries).¹¹ Clear, transparent, and consistent communication is vital for managing public and market expectations towards the policy’s ultimate price stability objective, particularly in a country where monetary policy aims to control the growth of the money supply to achieve price stability.

20. As any central bank, the CBvS must tailor its policy communication practices to its own policy conduct needs and Suriname’s unique economic context and challenges. Certain aspects of the “standard package”, such as the depth and frequency of communication, must be adapted to address the specific challenges of Suriname’s economy and monetary policy framework. The CBvS faces particular challenges, such as exchange rate volatility and vulnerability to external shocks, which require a flexible communication strategy. The CBvS should place emphasis on communicating the control of monetary aggregates and its implications for price stability and broader economic stability, given that monetary targeting is central to its policy approach. By adopting this approach, the CBvS can ensure that its communication not only improves public understanding but also supports the effectiveness of its monetary policy framework in addressing Suriname’s unique economic circumstances.

21. The Strategy should also aim to streamline the organization and execution of overall policy communications across the CBvS. The mission recognizes the need to enhance collaboration between the Communication Department and the relevant expert departments in preparing communication outputs on monetary policy and financial stability and dealing with public inquiries. Under the Strategy, the Communication Department will function as a central hub, processing all media inquiries and public requests, including those related to open market operations, which are a focal point of the investing public. It will seek expert advice from relevant departments to determine the most appropriate responses. An internal Q&A and message handbook should be developed — and continuously updated as a “living document” – to serve as a valuable tool for ensuring consistency in publicly delivered messages. It should also enable responses to frequently asked questions by the public without requiring consultation with expert departments in every instance.

22. As a rule, the Communication Department staff should be involved in the drafting and review of the press releases on policy. It is the mission’s understanding that this is not a regularly observed practice. The regular involvement of communication specialists ensures that the texts are accessible to the public and contain the right messages and that any layering of communications, including on social media, is consistent with the core monetary policy narrative. Another good practice is to develop a reference document within the Communications Department that provides speaking guidelines for public engagements with suggested key messages on current policy topics to ensure the central bank’s representatives speak in one voice.

23. The guidelines for communication on monetary policy by Executive Board members and CBvS staff require clarification. With the introduction of new communication tools and more frequent public outreach as foreseen by the new Strategy, the CBvS needs to make internally clear who the authorized public speakers on monetary policy are. Enforcing a stiff internal communications policy and setting clear internal rules for staff on public and media communications helps prevent miscommunication in the media and the public around policy actions and leanings. In leading central banks, the rules for public communications of members in policy panels and their roles and responsibilities are typically specified. This internal regulation may designate specific department heads as expert spokespersons in their respective areas of expertise or establish guidelines for observing a so–called quiet (or blackout¹²) period during the days leading up to key decisions.

Current decision-making practices on monetary policy and financial stability

25. Monetary policy formulation and preparation of inputs for monetary policy decision-making has been taking place on the platform of the Monetary Policy Advisory Committee (MPAC). The MPAC is an advisory body chaired by the Head of the Statistics Department, consisting of the heads of policy-relevant departments (Research, Open Market Operations, Banking Supervision, Financial Markets, and Financial Stability). The MPAC provides advice on the operational targets to be pursued and the method of policy implementation, while the Executive Board serves as the ultimate policy decision-making body, reaching decisions by consensus.¹³

26. While the MPAC is intended to meet monthly, the mission understands that the advisory panel’s meetings have been rather irregular. There is no fixed calendar of MPAC meetings, and as a result, the monetary policy stance is not subject to regular, periodic review. During MPAC meetings, members take positions on the desired direction of monetary policy for the upcoming period, and the MPAC policy recommendation is presented in an internal report submitted to the Director of the Directorate of Monetary Affairs (DMZ), who – as a member of the Executive Board – is a policy maker. Once the Board adopts a decision, the resulting policy is implemented at the Board’s direction. The CBvS has not yet established a routine for externally communicating its monetary policy stance.

27. The Financial Stability Advisory Committee (FSAC), led by the Head of the Financial Stability Department, was established to enhance financial stability processes. The committee was created in 2016 and is in line with recommendations from the CARTAC TA mission conducted in 2022. This advisory body includes representatives from all relevant departments within the CBvS. It convenes quarterly to review and discuss regular financial stability updates prepared by the Financial Stability Department and to reflect on the latest macrofinancial developments using all available data. Those updates are short providing a few key indicators.

Enhancing monetary policy decision-making

28. Following a review of the decision-making practices, the mission recommends that the CBvS streamline the internal monetary policy formulation, leading to a monetary policy stance decision. The MPAC meetings should be convened at regular intervals – eight times a year as opposed to the current intended monthly frequency – under a fixed meeting schedule that should be firm for at least 12 months ahead. A detailed calendar¹⁴ with binding deadlines for the submission of all necessary inputs for the MPAC’s consideration should be developed and regularly observed. The regular MPAC meeting should take place at a pre-determined interval, ideally not more than one week, prior to the policy-setting meeting of the Executive Board. The internal report on monetary policy should be drafted in advance of each MPAC meeting and finalized upon the meeting’s conclusion by adding the MPAC’s consensus monetary policy recommendation. This is essential to lay the groundwork for the future implementation of regular external communication regarding monetary policy decisions. In addition to the regular MPAC meetings, additional ad-hoc meetings could be scheduled in cases of any unforeseen circumstances.

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A sample of a simple decision-making calendar

Citation: Technical Assistance Reports 2025, 033; 10.5089/9798229007290.019.A001

Source: Mission

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29. The Executive Board should review the CBvS’s policy stance eight times a year. This is in line with the prevailing practice of inflation-oriented central banks¹⁵. This meeting schedule facilitates a frequent reassessment of the adequacy of the policy stance, enabling the CBvS to respond promptly to economic developments. It also optimizes the workload of staff by reducing the need to prepare inputs for decision-making meetings monthly while ensuring the timely preparation of all relevant inputs. The calendar with eight meetings a year will allow the CBvS in the future to smoothly transition to a standard monetary policy cycle involving four meetings with full-fledged policy reviews, complemented by four interim reviews in between the major meetings (typically in central banks held in quarterly intervals, to align with the quarterly releases of the national accounts data). In such a setup, ad-hoc review meetings may be necessary only in the event of major unexpected shocks that clearly warrant a significant revision of the policy stance.

30. Each Executive Board meeting on the policy should conclude with the adoption of a directive on the desired monetary policy stance and a discussion of policy-consistent communication messages. The directive should give the relevant departments guidelines for the operational implementation of the desired direction of monetary policy for the upcoming period. As input for the forthcoming meeting, expert staff will report back to the Board on the results of policy implementation. It is also essential to discuss key communication messages on the adopted monetary policy stance in the Executive Board to formulate a policy-consistent narrative for subsequent communication outputs.

31. Going forward, it is important to enhance the transparency of monetary policy decision-making at the CBvS. Once the decision-making practices have been internally set, the deliberation process leading to a monetary policy decision should be openly described publicly. The role of MPAC in the internal policy formulation process – as an advisory body charged with making recommendations to the policy-making Executive Board – should be communicated externally. This transparency can be achieved through a detailed description of the decision–making process in a dedicated section on the CBvS website, as well as by including a permanent preface in the CBvS’s economic reports. This report section would explicitly outline the policy formulation framework and all the steps leading to a monetary policy decision.

32. In the future, the CBvS should adopt the best practices of central banking by announcing the calendar of regular policy meetings well in advance. Leading central banks publish a calendar with regular meeting dates for the entire year in advance to ensure transparency and predictability in decision–making. This practice informs market participants about scheduled policy decisions well ahead of time, helping to reduce market uncertainty and volatility.

Enhancing financial stability reviews process

33. The CBvS should adopt a regular practice of scheduling Executive Board meetings four times per year to review financial stability assessments. These meetings should be integrated into the regular board meeting schedule and ideally preceded by discussions at the FSAC one week prior. The meetings should be planned a year in advance. Dedicating four board meetings exclusively to financial stability would emphasize its significance as the CBvS’s secondary objective, as outlined in its mandate. During these meetings, the Chair of the FSAC should present the outcomes of FSAC discussions based on the financial stability updates. One of those meetings should focus specifically on the FSR. In addition to the regular quarterly FSAC meetings, ad-hoc meetings may be scheduled in response to unforeseen circumstances, followed by Board meetings focused on financial stability topics.

34. Transparency in financial stability is critical to fostering trust and accountability. The CBvS should ensure that the newly established practices in these areas are fully transparent by publicly communicating key decisions and insights from the quarterly Executive Board meetings based on FSAC discussions. This can be achieved through the timely publication of meeting summaries, key findings, and policy decisions, making them accessible to relevant stakeholders and the public. Additionally, the CBvS should utilize press releases, public statements, and regular updates on its website to highlight progress, address challenges, and explain the rationale behind its decisions, further reinforcing its commitment to transparency in financial stability processes.

35. Similarly to monetary policy, a detailed description of the financial stability review process should be communicated. This can be achieved through a dedicated section on the CBvS website and by including a permanent preface in the CBvS’s FSR. A fully established and transparent process will also facilitate the decision-making process once the macroprudential framework is fully developed and operational.

Communications Toolkit

41. The mission recommends developing standard instruments for monetary policy communication. The recommendations focus on introducing new communication tools to bring the CBvS’s toolkit portfolio and tactics with the state-of-the-art practices employed by inflation-focused central banks (see Table 1 for an overview of the main monetary policy communications tools). The CBvS would do well in the coming period to focus on increasing clarity and consistency of its communication, and ensure that all key stakeholders, including the financial markets and the wider public, have equal access to critical information.

^{Table 1.}

Suriname: Overview of Main Monetary Policy Communications Tools

Source: Mission recommendations

^{Table 1.}

Suriname: Overview of Main Monetary Policy Communications Tools

Source: Mission recommendations

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^{Table 1.}

Suriname: Overview of Main Monetary Policy Communications Tools

Source: Mission recommendations

Monetary Policy Statement

42. The CBvS should adopt a standard practice of publishing a Monetary Policy Statement (MPS) in the form of a press release following each regular policy review meeting. The MPS needs to articulate clearly the reasons for policy decisions and tie them to the evaluation of outlook and risks for achieving price stability to spell out the specific factors and risks in an economic analysis to provide justification for the decision taken. Over time, the MPS could include forward-looking statements, both near-term forecast for inflation and hints at the future monetary policy stance. These enhancements would ultimately help reveal the CBvS’s policy reaction function, shape market expectations about its current and future actions, and, in turn, increase predictability over the long run, and, with it, the effectiveness of monetary policy.

43. The MPS should be published on the day of the policy decision, as soon as possible after its adoption by the Board. The best practice at inflation-focused central banks is to publish the news of a policy decision at a preset time, usually as soon as possible once the policymaking body has adopted a decision. Publishing the MPS at a preset time would strengthen the CBvS’s monetary policy communication’s predictability and mitigate the risk of any – potentially credibility-damaging – leak of market-sensitive information. The MPS would ideally be posted on the website at that exact time to make the news of a policy action immediately accessible to a wide array of audiences, both domestically and abroad. Posting the MPS on the CBvS website, especially in a format that makes it easy to copy and paste its text, would also help ensure that the media accurately reports on monetary policy decisions.

Monetary Policy Decision Press Conference

44. The CBvS should adopt a regular practice of holding a press conference, led by the Governor, in conjunction with the release of the MPS. The press conference could be held with a 1-to-2-hour delay from the MPS publication. Most inflation-oriented central banks first break the news of their decision via a press release, distributed to the news agencies, and other media and posted on the bank’s website. Only then, if not simultaneously, is the press conference held to elaborate on the press release. The recommended gap between the MPS release and the press conference would also provide media representatives with some time to digest the key messages and prepare better-informed questions for the policymakers.

45. The mission recommends that the CBvS use the press conference to deliver a high–level slide presentation with core headline messages. The press conference presentation should be published on the website immediately after its delivery at the event. Doing so would uphold the communication principle of simultaneously reaching all relevant target audiences, from financial markets to the general public. The slide deck should be prepared in a manner that provides the Communications Department with visual materials (including charts) for subsequent communications utilizing the website and social media platforms. This approach aligns with the principle of layering information towards various audiences, thereby tailoring the messages and content to their respective levels of expertise.

Monetary Policy Report

46. The mission recommends that the CBvS consolidate its economic publications into a precursor Monetary Policy Report (MPR), which could later be developed into a full-fledged flagship publication. The CBvS should introduce an MPR in addition to its already established FSR as a flagship monetary policy publication. The precursor of a new MPR would ideally be drafted and discussed within the MPAC as an internal document to be submitted to the Board to support the subsequent policy deliberations in the Board’s regular meetings on monetary policy. When the Board has made a policy decision, the internal report should be converted into a public document as the MPR, incorporating any changes needed to make its contents consistent with the Board-adopted policy. The report should ideally be published within 3 weeks of the policy decision announcement.

47. The new MPR could be formed by merging the existing backward-looking Quarterly Report and the Economic Bulletin. The mission noted there is a certain overlap between the two publications. The recommended approach would mean that the policy-relevant and inflation-focused content of the Economic Bulletin is replaced by the new MPS, and the Quarterly Report is superseded by the new MPR. The CBvS’s existing publications already include discussions of short-term inflation projections, which could serve as the foundation for the forward-looking chapters of the new MPR.

48. The mission advises that the CBvS gradually – and over time – aspire to make the MPR forward-looking, and policy focused. Leading central banks have adopted a “top-down” approach to their policy reporting, presenting the forecast and policy implications at the beginning of their publications and reserving detailed, backward–looking information about past economic developments to the later parts and statistical annexes. Making the MPR – gradually and over time – more forward-looking would underscore a gradually increasing emphasis on a forward-looking nature of policymaking under the CBvS’s reserve money targeting regime geared toward price stability.

Comprehensive Outreach Program

49. To support the introduction of new communication practices and tools, the CBvS should develop a comprehensive outreach program for a diverse set of audiences. The CBvS should start routinely reaching out to the media, markets, and the wider public with messages about its policy decisions and how they relate to the primary objective of price stability within a framework with a floating exchange rate. This program would ideally involve proactive and frequent communication on social media about policy-relevant topics and panel or roundtable discussions of Board members and heads of relevant departments with key stakeholders.

50. As part of the program, the CBvS should engage more frequently with outside experts and other relevant stakeholders. The regular and frequent interactions of CBvS policymakers and management staff with a diverse group of expert audiences would increase policy transparency. As in many other peer central banks, the program may include organizing nationwide seminars and developing economic literacy programs tailored to young generations and other segments of the public, facilitating focused seminars for business leaders to address industry-specific concerns and discuss the macroeconomic outlook, and hosting town hall meetings to foster direct dialogue and transparency with stakeholders. Importantly, this outreach would provide a solid base for anchoring medium–term and long–term inflation expectations by detailing the policy motivations, the macroeconomic assumptions and the CBvS’s near-term inflation projections.

51. By increasing stakeholder engagement, the CBvS will foster clarity and a shared understanding of the economic challenges it faces in implementing price-stability-oriented policy. It would be important to use outreach events not only to inform about decisions, policy considerations, and macroeconomic analyses but also to hear out the stakeholders’ concerns. This will build trust, strengthen stakeholder relationships, and help prepare the ground for any future decision to be better understood and more likely to be better accepted. Embarking on an outreach program would also gradually enhance the profile of the CBvS as an open and accountable public institution that not only speaks to but also listens to its external audiences.