ARI Sharing Session with UMT

The Department of Accounting & Finance, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu (UMT) has invited the Accounting Research Institute (ARI) to share its experience and journey in becoming one of the country's six Higher Institutions' Centres of Excellence (HICoE) in Malaysia.

ARI was represented by Assoc. Prof Dr Zuraidah Mohd Sanusi, Deputy Director of ARI (Postgraduate & Innovation). A one-day "sharing session" was attended by researchers and lecturers from the Accounting and Finance department, UMT. The morning session was specifically dedicated for "ARI sharing session". Dr Zuraidah spoke on ARI evolution from an individual-based "special interest group" to a cluster-based research centre and finally to a HICoE. As a HICoE, ARI works in synergy with its partners by participating in collaborative research at the national and international level. Dr Zuraidah also spent some time to explain the MyRA instrument. Aspiring centre of excellence must understand the requirements of the MyRA instrument as it forms the tenet of HICoE evaluation.

Meanwhile, in the afternoon session Assoc. Prof Dr Zuraidah Mohd Sanusi shared some of her expertise in quantitative research method and statistical analysis with the participants. The session was officiated by the Assoc. Prof Dr Mohd Hassan Che Haat, the Head of Accounting & Finance Department. Also present was Dr Mohd Shaari Abd. Rahman, Deputy Dean (Academic & Students’ Affairs); Assoc Prof Dr Nur Azura Sanusi, Deputy Dean (Research and Graduate Studies) of the Faculty of Management & Economics, UMT; Dr Zalailah Salleh, Deputy Director of Center of Socioeconomic Development, UMT, and Dr Zunaidah Sulong, a representative from Universiti Sultan Zainal Abidin. Several research topics in the areas of Islamic Finance and Financial Criminology have been identified for possible future collaboration between ARI and UMT. The Eastcoast sea breeze is definitely a luxury opportunity for more ideas and creativity!!

Labour Day Announcement: Minimum Wage for Private Sector

This is an excerpt taken from the Sun Daily (Malaysia) dated 1st May 2012 A minimum wage of RM900 a month has been set for private sector workers in Peninsular Malaysia while their counterparts in Sabah and Sarawak will take home RM800 a month. This works out to RM4.33 per hour for those in the Peninsular while employees in Sarawak, Sabah and Federal Territory of Labuan are to be paid a minimum of RM3.85 per hour. The amount is applicable to all sectors except for workers in the domestic sector such as maids and gardeners.

In making the much-awaited minimum wage announcement at a pre-Workers Day event in Dewan Perdana of the Putrajaya International Convention Centre (PICC) today, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak said that the government has also set in motion mechanisms to ensure that the implementation of this will not burden employers, and at the same time not cause employees to incur losses by allowing the absorption of allowances or fixed cash payment in the calculation of minimum wage. “This is a special gift from the government to all workers in Malaysia,” said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak in making the much awaited minimum wage announcement at a pre-Workers' Day event in Dewan Perdana of the Putrajaya International Convention Centre (PICC) today. He said that the government has also put in place mechanisms to ensure that the implementation of minimum wage will not burden employers, and at the same time not incur losses for employees by allowing the absorption of allowances or fixed cash payment in the calculation of minimum wage.

Post Graduate Program Revisited

The Faculty of Accountancy organized a three-day workshop to discuss ways of improving its post graduate programs. Currently, the faculty offers three course-based master programs: Master of Accountancy, Master in Corporate Governance and Master in Forensic Accounting and Financial Criminology.

In addition, there's two research-based programs: Master of Science (Accounting) and PhD (Accounting). The Accounting Research Institute (ARI)and the Faculty of Accountancy co-offer research-based Master and PhD programs in the niche area of Islamic Financial Criminology. The Vice Chancellor of UiTM, Dato' Prof. Ir Dr Sahol Hamid Abu Bakar officiated the event and participated in the first session of the workshop. He shared his vision and aspirations about post graduate programs in Universiti Teknologi MARA.

ARI Visit to NCDRC

Two researchers from the Accounting Research Institute (ARI): Professor Dr Normah Omar and Professor Dr Rohana Othman have been invited by the National Child Development Research Centre

(NCDRC)of Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI)to share ARI's own experiences as a Higher Institution's Centre of Excellence (HICoE). The half-day talk was attended by more than fifty participants. One of NCDRC's future aspirations is to prepare itself as a potential HICoE candidate within the next few years. NCDRC is one of UPSI's pioneer centre of excellence. Established more than ten years ago, the centre carries out education-related research,for the purpose of creating and legislating the curriculum for early childhood education and preschools.

It is also involved in parenting development programmes that provide parents with the knowledge to face future global challenges. The centre is also monitoring the implementation of the pilot programme "Anak Permata Negara" that was initiated under the management of the Prime Minister's Department and has since expanded countrywide. With a specific niche in child development, NCDRC is certainly set to become the nation's centre of excellence.

Professor of Bibliometrics

The Accounting Research Institute (ARI)thanks Prof Dr Szarina Abdullah, who is mostly known for her scholarly works in "Bibliometrics". Professor Szarina recently retired from Universiti Teknologi MARA after successfully serving the university for more than thirty five years since 1973.

Prior to her recent retirement, Prof Szarina was leading one of the university's "Vice Chancellor Special Projects - VCSP" which aims to nurture top notch writers. Various strategies to promote scholarly writings have been initiated under her leadership. Today, committee members of the VCSP project organized a simple farewell ceremony for Prof Szarina. Also present at the farewell ceremony was the Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic and Internationalization) Professor Dr Azni Zain Ahmed. Thanks Prof Szarina for your

impressive commitment and leadership. Her scholarly works have given a lot of impetus to researchers, particularly in enhancing our understanding towards bibliometrics. Bibliometrics is a type of research method used in library and information science. It is a set of methods to quantitatively analyze scietific and technological literature. Citation analysis and content analysis are commonly used in bibliometric methods. Through her, the VCSP committee members have learned a lot of "publication terms" such as "citation index", "citation analysis" and "impact factor analysis". We will certainly miss you.....

ARI Talk at UNITEN

Two researchers from the Accounting Research Institute (ARI)have been invited by the College of Business Administration (COBA), Universiti Tenaga Nasional (UNITEN) at its Muadzam Shah campus to give a talk on the evolution and role of ARI as Higher Institutions' Centre of Excellence (HICoE). The three-hour talk was presented by Assoc. Prof Dr Zuraidah Mohd Sanusi, Deputy Director of ARI (Postgraduate & Innovation) and Assoc. Prof Dr Nawal Kasim, Head of ARI's Islamic Accounting and Muamalat Research Center.

Also present in the session was Y.Bhg.Dato’ Sri Mashuri Yaacob, Vice Chancellor of UNITEN, Prof Ir Dr Ibrahim, Deputy Vice Chancellor (Academic), Dr Shaari Mat Noor, Deputy Vice Chancellor Campus KSHAS, Tn Hj Sakarno Dris, Dean of COBA and Assoc. Prof Dr Izham Datuk Zainal Abidin, Dean of College of Postgraduate Studies. About 50 participants from among UNITEN's various Centers of Excellence and lecturers in UNITEN attended the session. As a private university in Malaysia, UNITEN aspires to "upgrade" its current centres of excellence to a HICoE status. As a HICoE focussing on a specific niche research in the area of Islamic Financial Criminology ARI welcomes joint efforts and possible research collaborations with UNITEN.

Focus Group Interview at IIM

The Accounting Research Institute (ARI) thanks the Malaysian Institute of Integrity (IIM) for arranging a focus group interview session with several internal auditors in the Klang Valley. The half-day event which was held at the IIM office in Jalan Duta forms part of ARI-IIM collaborative research on the Role of the Internal Audit function to enhance corporate governance

in business organizations. Among the issues raised and discussed include risk management, performance audit, internal control system, the role of the Board of Directors, Audit Committee and Whistle Blowing policy and whistle blowing protection for employees. There's also discussions on the role of the new social media as a communication channel for employees to discuss governance issues in organizations. ARI researchers have also beeb invited to participate in the forthcoming Corporate Governance week in Bursa Malaysia at the end of May 2012.

Made-in Malaysia Innovations: A RM1 Billion Revenue Potential

This entry is an extract from the Star Online dated Friday April 20, 2012:

"Malaysian businesses can start bidding from today for locally developed innovations that have the potential to yield up to RM1bil in revenue. Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak unveiled the 42 commercially ready products that have been developed under the Innovation Business Opportunities programme. They range from a disease-resistant chili to larvacide to control mosquito-borne diseases, from a biosensor to diagnose specific infections to lumber made from oil palm, from a rice cooker that automatically drains excess starch to a body armour made of coconut fibre, kevlar and glass; and from a high quality cross-bred rice suitable for diabetics to a pendant system that mounts all or most medical equipment used to treat patients.
. The products were developed by a collection of local companies, universities and research institutes and selected by Agensi Innovasi Malaysia based on the potential for commercialisation. The Prime Minister said the products could collectively bring in an estimated RM1bil by the third year of marketing. “This is just the starting point,” he said when launching the programme in his office here yesterday.
“The programme offers local companies the chance to harness the power of innovation to gain an edge in their business while helping to monetise the many projects developed locally. This is in line with the Government's efforts to reinforce innovation." While the programme was aimed to promote the culture of competitive bidding in the private sector, Najib said the Government could consider providing support in terms of loans and certain incentives

Collaboration with the Malaysian Tax Academy of IRB

Delegation of officers from the Malaysian Tax Academy (APM)of the Malaysian Inland Revenue Board visited the Accounting Research Institute (ARI) at the later's office in Universiti Teknologi MARA in Shah Alam. APM's delegation was led by its Director Tuan Haji Adzhar Sulaiman. APM is a training institute of the Malaysian Inland Revenue Board. In addition to the training of IRB's own staff, APM also conduct trainings for outside and international agencies. Among the international agencies that have benefited from APM trainings include officers from Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), Commonwealth Association of Tax Administrators (CATA), Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), International Bureau of Fiscal Documentation (IBFD), Australian Taxation Office (ATO), Internal Revenue Srvice (IRS) and the Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI). The meeting discussed potential collaborations between the two entities in at least five important areas: (i) Collaborative research in taxation-related policy and practice, (ii) Training, (iii) Joint publication of tax-related articles in journals and books, (iv) Co-organizing of the International Conference in Financial Criminology (ICFC) in 2013 and (v)Joint-editorial of an international journal in taxation that APM hopes to produce very soon. ARI-APM collaboration in these five possible areas is indeed very timely. Way back in 2003, UiTM researchers and lecturers were involved in conducting two cohorts of special training in Forensic Accounting for IRB Tax Investigators. Several IRB staff have also successfully completed their Master in Forensic Accounting & Financial Criminology at the Faculty of Accountancy, UiTM.

Research on Financial Integrity

Today, a group of researchers from the Accounting Research Institute (ARI) visited the Perbadanan Insurans Deposit Malaysia (PIDM) office in Kuala Lumpur. A meeting has been arranged with PIDM's Non-Executive Chairman, Tan Sri Abdul Samad Alias to discuss possible case study project on PIDM. Tan Sri Abdul Samad has served as a Board Member of PIDM since 15 August 2005, and chaired PIDM’s Audit Committee. A Fellow Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia, he has extensive experience in auditing and accounting including as the non-Executive Chairman of Ernst & Young. PIDM is a statutory body that actively promotes and contributes to public confidence in the stability of the Malaysian financial system. It also protects depositors against the loss of their deposits as well as takaful and insurans benefits in the unlikely event of a member institution failure. At the recent NACRA 2011 award, PIDM won the "Best Annual Report for Non-Listed Companies". What is interesting about PIDM's annual report is the introduction of new initiatives by the company to ensure financial credibility of its accounting numbers. A comprehensive deliberation is included in the annual report to discuss policy and implementation practices of its (i) Risk Management, (ii) Corporate Governance and (iii) Internal Control system. Though PIDM is a government company formed under the purview of the Ministry of Finance, PIDM takes it upon itself to govern and drive the company as a "business entity".
As such, PIDM's statement of corporate governance has been observed as one of the most comprehensive in this country. ARI researchers hope to write a case study on PIDM's Financial Integrity very soon. Financial Integrity encompasses the whole spectrum of financial reporting supply chain processes and procedures. More meetings will be organized with PIDM's management team in the future. ARI wishes to thank Tan Sri Abdul Samad Haji Alias, PIDM Chairman; Ms Norrida Baharuddin, Chief Internal Auditor and General Manager and Ms Lim Yam Poh, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary for spending your valuable time with our researchers.