MANGALORE: Students and teachers of Commerce need not feel that their education is irrelevant as Commerce education and

practice is experiencing a paradigm shift and will soon emerge as a key subject, said experts at the inaugural function of the Mangalore Pre-University Commerce Teachers' Association here on Tuesday. Federation of University College Teachers Associations Karnataka president A.M. Narahari, who inaugurated the association, said Commerce had to be given a new dimension by teachers. Commerce education should be "fruit bearing" and not just "light giving", he said. Mr. Narahari said the aim should be to make student skilful and conceptually strong rather than just being "functional". But everything depends on teachers, who have to prevail upon the policy-makers to achieve this. He said the concept of virtual classroom was a design to leave out teachers from the new scheme of education. Deputy Director of Pre-University Education Sheelavathi and Badriya College Principal Ismail spoke. In the interest of the people, I find it essential to acknowledge and shar e with eve r yon e t he ex pe ri e nc e that I h ave gained in the two days seminar at NEHU, Shillong 07-08-2006 because we always n e e d t o i n n ov a t e o u r t h o u g h t s a n d w i d e n our knowl edge and that is w hat I have

g a i n f r o m t h e s e m i n a r. National seminar on "Global conver gence of commerce Education" was or ganised by Depar tment of Commerce NEHU Shillong and Institute of Char tered Accountants of India, New Delhi. The sole aim of the seminar was to a ck nowl e dg e ever yo ne i n pa r ti c ul a r th e students, that due to globalisation of business and tr ade r elated activities there is a vast need for har monizing the accounting, repor ting techniques and trade related activities. T h e s emi nar has t aken i nt o consideration the implications of United Nations (UN), the Or ganisation for Economic Co- oper ation and Devel opment (OECD) Paris, European Union (EU), W o r l d Tr a d e O r g a n i s a t i o n ( W TO s ) , G e n e r a l A g r e e m e n t o n Tr a d e i n S e r v i c e s ( G AT S ) , I n t e r n a t i o n a l Fe d e r a t i o n o f A c c o u n t a n t ( I FA C ) . In the seminar 36 delegates presented their papers. T he two day seminar was divided into four technical sessions. 1st Te c h n i c a l S e s s i o n w a s b a s i c a l l y m e a n t f o r Accounting Education and Research, 2 n d Te c h n i c a l S e s s i o n f o r WTO and Developing Nations, 3 r d Te c h n i c a l S e s s i o n f o r SME Management a n d 4 t h Te c h n i c a l S e s s i o n f o r Infor mation Technology and e-commerce.

Many impor tant personnel from the concer n area grace the seminar and place their views and opinions so as to supplement the ideas and opinions expr essed by the dele gates. T hough all r es o ur ce a nd ex pe ri e nc ed p er s ons gave valuable infor mations, I would specially want to menti on the speeches deliver ed b y D r. T P G h o s h , I C A I - N e w D e l h i , S . K . T i w a r e , C h i e f S e c r e t a r y, G ov t . o f M e g h a l a y a a n d P r o f. S . N a n d y, I I T Guwahati. D r. T P G h o s h s h a r e d a n i m p o r t a n t p o i n t with all regarding the Impact of Economic Refor ms and Globalisation on A c c o u n t i n g a n d G ov e r n a n c e . H i s p a p e r was based on a recent study on c or po r ate gover na nc e i n te n c ou nt ri es i n Asia. He placed the fact that India r an ked fo ur th i n th e r e g i o n. Si ng a p o r e, H o n g ko n g a n d M a l a y s i a a r e a h e a d o f I n d i a , S o u t h K o r e a , Ta i w a n , T h a i l a n d , Philippines, China and Indonesia are behind. I n e n f o r c e m e n t , o n l y H o n g ko n g a n d Singapore are ahead of India. Indian i n v e s t o r s a r e w i l l i n g t o p a y a g ov e r n a n c e premium of 23 percent, conceivably for lower a gency cos ts. S.K. Tiwari humbled hi ms el f by ex pr es s i n g th at h e i s ver y much illiterate about commer ce and business.

N eve r th el es s b ei n g a ver y s eni or a nd well experi enced admi nistr ative of fi cer he deliber ately point out the relativity of the system of financial repor ting with that of the economic, le gal, educational a n d p o l i t i c a l i n s t i t u t i o n s i n a c o u n t r y. His view was that there have been major changes in financial repor ting in India since the economic refor ms and globalisation began in the ear ly 1990s. His noble opinion in the context of the seminar was that commerce education shoul d be in conver gence with the g lobal requirement but basically should be diver gence in function. Pr of S Nandy gave a ver y infor mative speech. He was taking about C2B - a futur e prospective of customer to Business. T he most impor tant point was that C2B will be a new empower ment of customers. C2B will be coming. It will be accepted not just by the businessmen but by the whole community of academics, politics, economics and other s because C2B is basically for the public. In the ver y fi r st techni cal session of Accounting Education and Resear ch four dele gates placed cer tain basic facts. L e e n a B . D a m , F a c u l t y I C FA I N a t i o n a l College, Guwahati, attempted through her paper to study the r esear ch done in the field of accounting and also

suggested fur ther scope for research and devel opment. P r o f. R . K . G u p t a , P U , C h a n d i g a r h stressed the need to integrate the a cc ou nti ng r es ea r ch wi t h e nv i r o nm en tal data as well as decision making in or ganizations. T hen, Shr uveer S. B h a n a w a t , S r. L e c t , B N P G C o l l e g e U d ai p ur g ave a di s cl os u r e a b ou t t he Accounting of Intellectual Proper ty Rights (IPG) with special reference to p h a r m a c e u t i c a l s i n d u s t r y. T h e m a i n o bj e cti ve of hi s p a p er was to p r ov i de a r oad map for cor por ate sector on how they can account for their IPRs. J a y a C h o u d h u r y, L e c t . , P r a g j y o t i s h College, Guwahati presented her paper on the career oppor tunities offered by forensic Accounting. She placed her o p i n i o n t h a t Fo r e n s i c A c c o u n t i n g i s a n emer ging br anch of accounting focussing m ai nl y o n f r a ud i nves ti gati on an d pr eventi on, dispute r esol ution, litigati on suppor t and other criminal i nves ti g ati o ns . Under the second technical Session, 12 delegates presented their papers on the W TO a n d D e v e l o p i n g E c o n o m i e s . A n d a t the ver y onset, Pr of S. Borbor a, IIT G u w a h a t i t a l ke d a b o u t d i f f e r e n t c o m p l e x i s s u e s i n v o l v e d i n t h e W TO i m p l i c a t i o n s m ai nl y i n t he co nt ex t o f ne go ti ati ons o n

agriculture. His paper focussed on cer tain areas on A g ri cul t ur e n e go ti ati ons l i ke do mes ti c suppor t and expor t subsidies with the main objective to identify possible futur e str ate g y for the devel opi ng countries. I, myself followed his speech. M y p a p e r w a s o n t h e F r e e Tr a d e i n H i g h e r E d u c a t i o n u n d e r t h e W TO ' s G AT S : Oppor tunities and challenges with special reference to India. My paper was an effor t to highlight the emerging trends of higher education in I ndi a i n t he co nt ex t of g l ob al is ati on. For the pur pose of my presentation I concentrated on cer tain statistical figures which I felt should be given mor e emphasis to give a compar ative account.

Higher Education is basically recognized as a ser vice due to the fact that this sector has a huge potential customers in the for m of students wor ldwide. Inter national tr ade in higher education has been estimated to reach US$50 billion. T her e are 1.8 million inter national students w ho pur sue higher education and g r ow to 7.2 million by 2025. US ear ns $ 13 billion, Australia Aus $ 4.2

billion fr om inter national students i nves tm en t. In th e p r es en t exi s ti n g situation, I have placed the fact that our Indian education system is still lagging behind. Japan has 684 Univer sities, UK 104, Ger many 330 but India with more than 100 cr or es population has only 335 Univer sities and the per centa ge of enrolment relating to only 6% while UK accounts for 52%, US 80.9%, Indonesia 1 1 % . G ov t . e x p e n d i t u r e o n e d u c a t i o n a s propor tion of GNP of India is only 3.8 % even for Zimba bwe it is 8.3%. T h e p r ov i s i o n o f e d u c a t i o n i n 5 y e a r s pl ans r ea ch ed 5. 2 1% i n Fou r t h fi ve yea r s pl an bu t de cl i ne to 4. 25 % i n th e N i ne th five year s plan and the shar e of higher education in total expenditur e of education in 5 year s plan reached upto 25% in IV 5 year s plan but w hen a pp r oa ch to t he IX t h pl an i t al s o de cl i ne t o 1 0 % o n l y. So, at this pr esent rate, taking the oppor tunity of the seminar to interact with different resource persons, I s e eked th ei r o pi ni ons a bo ut t he i m p l i c a t i o n s o f W TO ' s G AT S w h i c h advocates for commer cialization of higher education and intr oduced this s e c t o r i n t h e o p e n m a r ke t .

Ever yone was of the opinion that the nation now needs a sensible policy w hich can give attenti on to the i m p l i c a t i o n s o f W TO ' s G AT S t a k i n g i t s positive per spectives and at the same time anal ysing the ne gative implications a l s o . T h e n , Tu l i k a M a t t a c h , L e c t , D H S K C o mme r c e C ol l e ge, Di br u ga rh ex pr es s e d t h e v a r i o u s a s p e c t o f t h e W TO aggreements and their significance to the devel opi ng countries of the wor ld t h r o u g h h e r p a p e r e n t i t l e d " W TO a n d D evel opi ng Ec on omi es ". A . K . V a s h i s t , P r o f. P U , . C h a n d i g a r h highlighted the refor m measures u n d e r t a ke n b y t h e G ov t . i n t h e d i r e c t i o n o f wor l d cl as s pat en ts i n In di a an d thei r implications and impediments under the title of his paper "Intellectual proper ty Rights in India - Issues and challenges". In a paper under the topic of Impact of Globalization of life Insur ance Sector with r efer ence to Mizoram, LG Singh, L e c t u r e r i n C o m m e r c e , G ov t . A i z a w l colle ge gave an account about the impact of globalization on life insur ance sector in India as well as in Mizoram r e l a t i n g t o g r o w t h , m a r ke t s h a r e perfor mance and new challenges par ticular ly after the entr y of private players. Issues r el ating to devel opi ng countri es

i n W TO r e g i m e w e r e p l a c e d b e f o r e t h e par ticipant and the other present in the seminar in a ver y precise manner by S u r y a N a r a g a n R a y, L e c t i n c o m m e r c e , D i n h a t a c o l l e g e , D i n h a t a , C o o c h B e h a r. D i p a n ke r S h o m e , R e s e a r c h S c h o l a r D e p t . o f C omm er ce, N EH U, Shi l l o ng ex p r es s ed the imperative r equir ement on the par t of India to ensure a str ong r e gulator y super visor mechanism for banking sector u n d e r t h e t o p i c o f G AT S c o m m i t m e n t s and Refor ms in Indian Banking. Fur ther more, the need to strengthen the r e gional economi c devel opi ng str ate gies of devel opi ng countries under the economic implications of SAARC and W TO w a s e x p r e s s e d b y S a n j o y R i n z i n , Lect, Sherubtse, Kanglung Bhutan. D r. S w a t a n t r a K u m a r, F a c u l t y, R B Management Institute, Bareilly presented his paper on the tittle 'global supply chains: Problems and Prospects' in the post globalisation scenario so as to highlight global best practices, failures and prospects in global supply chain management. He placed the fact that in post globalisation scenario the Global Supply Chain Management is becoming an interesting area of a ca de mi c i nves ti gati o n. D r. K . C . K a b r a S r. L e c t D e p t . o f Commerce NEHU placed the major

challenges of the devel opi ng countries i n cl u di n g I ndi a t o th e v i a bi l i ty o f a g ricultur e mainl y in the context of high d om es ti c s u pp or t, ex po r t s ubs i di es an d d e n i a l o f m a r ke t a c c e s s t h r o u g h v a r i o u s tariff and non-tariff bar riers in the d evel o pe d c ou nt ri es . Intellectual Proper ty Right - Destination of III wor ld Nations was another paper thr ough which V Satyana-r ayana, Ass. P r o f. M e s c o I n s t i t u t e , H y d e r a b a d g a v e a n a cc ou nt a b o ut th e i ss u es i nvol ve d i n I PR with special r efer ence to its implication in the devel opi ng wor ld. T hen taking into consider ation the heter ogeneous status of the wor ld in t er ms o f l evel o f devel op me nt a nd di f fer ence in the path of devel opment adopted by the Nations, the paper of Vipin Nagi, Sherubtse College, Bhutan ar gued that the devel oping countries need protection for some time in cer tain specific areas before they can tap and realize their potential so as to be in a position to compete with the advanced countries. In the third technical session, 10 delegates presented their papers on the issues and problems of SME M a n a g e m e n t . B e n - j a m i n F. L y n g d o h , Lectur er NEHU, Deptt. of Mana gement and Bipasha Chetiya, Lect. Dibr ugarh

U n i v. , s e p a r a t e l y p r e s e n t e d t h e i r r espective pa per s on the oppor tuni ties of small and medium sized business in t h e To u r i s m i n d u s t r y p a r t i c u l a r l y f o r c r e ati n g s us t ai na bl e d evel o pme nt. T h ey co n cl u de th ei r p a pe r by gi v i n g us an optimistic appr oach that tourism d e v e l o p m e n t c a n p r ov i d e e m p l o y m e n t and associated benefits to the local c o m m u n i t y. A m a l e s h B h o w a l , R e a d e r, Dept. of Commer ce attempted thr ough his paper to measure the risk. Per ception of the employer s of the SBI wi t h t he as s u mp ti on of i nver s e r el ati ons hi p b et we en l evel of ri s k per ception in equi ty shar e investment a nd th e l evel o f e qui ty i nves tme nt an d di r e ct r el ati ons hi p b et we en t he l evel o f e qui ty s har e i nves tm en t a nd th e l evel o f entrepr eneurial cultur e initiation. It has become ver y impor tant for the SME entrepreneurial culture for their economic and technological d e v e l o p m e n t . T h e W TO c a n b e b e n e f i c i a l only to those states w hich ar e educating their SMEs in time and properly about the use and implications of IPRs. T hese w e r e t h e v i e w s o f D r. N a g e n d r a Ya d a v, Reader and Head, Dept. of Management S t u d i e s , U P R T O p e n U n i v. , U P i n h i s p a p e r " I P R f o r S M E i n t h e E r a o f W TO " .

In the wor k of Mukulesh Bar ua, A s s o c i a t e P r o f. A s s a m I n s t i t u t e o f Mana gement, Guwahati expr essed the point that SMEs account for a sizeable share of total business population of Assam and suppor t substantial employment oppor tunities for its youths. The well being of the SMEs holds enor mous significance for the economy of the state. The Small Scale Industries (SSI) sector plays a vital role in building the e c o n o m y o f a c o u n t r y. I n I n d i a , t h i s sector accounts for about 40 per cent of the total industrial output and contributes nearly 35 percent of the total dir ect expor ts. T he SSI sector has been assigned the target of annual gr owth of 12 per cent and cr eation of 4.4 m i l l i o n a d d i t i o n a l j o b s d u r i n g t h e Te n t h F i v e Ye a r P l a n . T h i s w a s t h e v i e w e x p r e s s e d b y R . K . P. G Singha, Dept of Commerce, Pachunga C o l l e g e , A i z a w l a n d N V R J y o t i K u m a r, Prof and Head Depar tment of Commerce, M i z o r a m U n i v. i n t h e i r p a p e r " M a n a g i n g Small Scale Industries" in Mizoram: Challenges and oppor tunities in which their paper identify the challenges and oppor tunities in managing small scale industries with special reference to Mizoram.

Under the topic of 'Role of Infor mation t ech nol og y - a mo de r n mar keti ng to ol fo r small and medium scale enter prises', A b h i j i t C h a k r a b o r t y, L e c t u r e r L i b e r t y Public College of Commerce, Nagaland, e x p l a i n t h e c o n c e p t o f m a r ke t i n g ( f r o m traditional to moder n view points) thereby emphasizing on the shift from pr otective policies to an envir onment of r e l a t i o n s h i p m a r ke t i n g c o n c e p t w h i c h r e v o l v e s a r o u n d t h e c u s t o m e r, h i s tastes, preferences per ception, behaviour etc. S . Ke s h o r j i t S i n g h , M I M S , M a n i p u r U n i v e r s i t y, C a n c h i p u r, I m p h a l p r e s e n t e d a paper under the title "T he knowledge entrepreneur - the emerging trend". He was of the view that knowledge is the cor e factor with which KE differ entiate thems elves fr om tr adi tional entrepreneurs and common businessmen by simply doing something "unusual" and " un ex pe ct ed ". T hey r ule the knowledge economy by the process of wealth creation rather than wealth accumulation and become celebrities through their success. "Small and Medium enter prises Management: A r oadmap for the success of E ntr ep r e n eu r s hi p D evel op me nt i n In di a ". This was also one impor tant topic p r e s e n t e d b y S w e l a B a n e r j e e , F a c u l t y, I C FA I U n i v e r s i t y, I C FA I N a t i o n a l C o l l e g e ,

Guwahati. K h . To m b a S i n g h , L e c t . D e p a r t m e n t o f C o m m e r c e , A s s a m U n i v e r s i t y, S i l c h a r, under the topic "An analysis of Industrial Sickness in Small Scale Industries Sector-a case study of SSI U ni ts i n M ani pu r" i n t he co nt ex t o f th e era of privatisation with growing competitiveness, L a s t l y t h e I V Te c h n i c a l S e s s i o n c o n f i n e s o n I n f o r m a t i o n Te c h n o l o g y a n d e c omm er ce . T he r e wer e s eve n d el e gates w ho presented the paper s. 1st Amitav N at h, B us i nes s D evel opm en t Exec uti ve, P r o d u c t P r o m o t i o n G r o u p , C - DA C ( Fo r m e r l y N C S T ) , B a n g a l o r e Ta l k e d a b o u t Rur al e-Commer ce for Gr owth and P r o s p e r i t y, u n d e r w h i c h h e p o i n t o u t t h e fact that ICT has a long way to go to r each upto the r ur al areas of India for social benefits. Globalisation, e-commer ce and IT in India: Issues and Challenges was a paper p r e s e n t e d b y J a y a n t i N i n g o m b a , S r. L e c t u r e r, D e p t . o f A c c o u n t i n g , D . M . College of Commerce, Imphal were she studied the emerging trend and issues in the IT and e-commerce sector in the wake of n ew k n owl ed ge ec on omy an d t o explor e the viable policies and str ate gi es on the futur e devel opment and gr owth of these emer ging sector in

India. Then, Subhendu Dutta, Dept. of Economics, Public College of Commerce, D i m a p u r, N a g a l a n d u n d e r t h e t o p i c "Emerging Scenario of ElectronicBanking in India" point out the d evel o pm en ts of co r e b an ki n g i n t he recent year in the for m of Inter net and Intranet enable ser vice. Te c h n i c a l i s s u e s i n e - B a n k i n g w a s a paper presented by Pur na Prasad Shar ma, Depar tment of Commerce, BBS College, Shillong where he discussed the impor tance of e-Banking in today's wor ld o f vi r t ual m ar ket. S . S o m o k a n t a S i n g h , F a c u l t y, M I M S , M a n i p u r U n i v e r s i t y, I m p h a l m a d e a n endeavour towar ds looking into the various technological aspects and applications of e-commerce under his paper "M-commerce: a paradigm shift of business patter n. M. Moses Antony Rajendran, Senior Lecturer in Commerce, Sher ubtse College, Kanglung, Bhutan presented his paper entitled "Driver of success of e-commerce" his view was that e-commer ce is yet to be devel oped in the tr ue sense of the wor d although in s om e s ec to r s d evel o pm en t mi gh t have been visible. In the ver y outs et Manoj Rana, Assistant

L i b r a r i a n , N E H U C e n t r a l L i b r a r y, S h i l l o n g threw light on the concept of ecommer ce, the security issues r elated with conducting business electronically and its problems and prospects. I n t h e v a l e d i c t o r y S e s s i o n , P r o f. N . S r i v a s t a v, D e a n E M I S , N E H U t h a n k e d a l l the par ticipants and at the same time expr essed his desir e to r ealise the imper ativeness that during the highly challenging era of globalization and competition, the Indi an Univer siti es should join hands with the ICAI so as to help students attain a useful mix of academic and professional lear ning. The two days seminar has most vitally been or ganised with the prime objective of strengthening the educational needs of students. The Board of Studies has actually been benefited with the motivation, aspiring issues, concer ning pr oblems laid down by the r es our ce persons, delegates, par ticipant students, faculties of univer sities of different par ts of the countries. T h r o ug h thi s ar ti cl e I wo ul d s pe ci al l y want that the same spirit and encouragement be felt by all the students, scholar s and faculties of our Univer sity and I hope I could in some par ts be successful in doing so.

Ta k i n g t h i s o p p o r t u n i t y t o p u b l i s h t h e p r o c e e d i n g o f t h e S e m i n a r, I w o u l d l i ke to thank and expr ess my g r atitude to J a m e s E . H a r t l e y, A s s o c i a t e P r o f e s s o r o f E c o n o m i c s , M o u n t H o l y y o ke C o l l e g e , Massachusetts and S.K. Tiwari Chief S e c r e t a r y, G ov t . o f M e g h a l a y a w h o s h o w e d s p e c i a l i n t e r e s t i n m y p a p e r, inspired me to wor k more and encourage me to publish the paper in the interest o f w h o l e s t u d e n t c o m m u n i t y. L a s t b u t n o t l e a s t I a l s o t h a n ke d S . G u n a d h a r, P r i n c i p a l , R . K . S . C . E a n d C . M a i s n a m , A s s t . P r o f. M . U . , E c o . D e p t . f o r p r ov i d i n g v a r i o The importance of

commerce and commercial principles in determining the well-being of society

How graduates in commerce can contribute By Jeff Borland

For those of you who graduate with a Bachelor of Commerce, I feel I am something of a bookend. I was a lecturer in your first semester at the University of Melbourne, and now you are hearing from me again at the very end of your studies. You will be pleased to know that I am not going to engage in a final revision of demand and supply or game theory. Instead, I propose to look in the opposite direction forward, to where you are heading next. This is exciting because there is much to look forward to in your professional lives. It is something that always comes home to me when I meet up with our Honours alumni in Economics. They are a small snapshot of the totality of commerce graduates, but from this group I can tell you that there is currently: one member of the Federal shadow cabinet

and one newly elected member of the Victorian Parliament; a former secretary and a deputy secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet; heads of Investment Banking and Mergers and Acquisitions at major international investment banks; professors at Oxford, Stanford, and the University of British Columbia; partners in many law firms, and more generally, many working in government departments with responsibility for economic policy and in large economics consulting firms around the world. In fact, I counted fourteen different countries where our alumni are currently working. This list suggests that an education in commerce can be the start of a very diverse range of careers in which many past students from Melbourne have excelled. However, as good as the opportunities have been in the past, I believe that they have never been greater or more exciting. Todays commerce graduates are in a prime position to make a contribution to society. This is mainly because commercial activity and the principles generally associated with commerce have never before been so influential in determining the well-being of people in many countries. I will use some Australian examples to illustrate this point but they also apply to other countries. One example is the finance sector. Today, the wealth and living standards of households in Australia depend more than ever on the quality of decisions on asset management made in the finance sector. In his recent Boyer lectures, the former Governor of the Reserve Bank, Ian Macfarlane, noted how in the period from 1985 to 2005 holdings of financial assets in Australia increased from 100 per cent to 350 per cent of GDP, and that an increasing proportion of these assets have been financed with debt. In his words, if a large fall in asset prices or a recession were to occur, the effectwould be greater than in the past. In the government sector, the importance of commercial principles is also evident. Major reforms have taken place in Australia since the mid 1980s, such as privatisation and the application of financial criteria in setting new performance

standards for government enterprises and departments. Further, in the exciting field of economic design, governments are trying to apply market mechanisms to deal with such problems as: reducing emission of pollutants; improving biodiversity; providing greater R&D incentives to private drug companies to develop vaccines for third-world diseases such as malaria; and efficiently allocating public resources, such as radio spectrum and marine resources, between potential users. The importance of commercial principles is also apparent in the not-for-profit sector. This is reflected in the weight that so many of these organisations now attach to them and in their desire to learn from (as well as teach to) the private sector. A good friend from my Economics Honours year, Michael Traill, gave the Occasional Address at a graduation earlier this year. He is the CEO of an organisation called Social Ventures Australia, which has as its mission to deal with some of Australia's social problems by applying business principles drawn from the commercial sector and working in partnership with outstanding social entrepreneurs. Emphasising the need to build bridges, he explained how important various initiatives had been to improve educational outcomes for indigenous Australians and to increase employment opportunities for school leavers in high unemployment regions. Thus, the skills that come with a commerce degree are relevant in every corner of society for running successful private companies, for governments to be able to contribute the greatest good to society, and for socially effective not-forprofit organisations. The exciting prospect about graduating with a commerce degree is that it offers endless opportunities for doing valuable work where you will know that your role has been essential. Should you feel confident that you will be able to take advantage of the opportunities that are available? The answer is definitely yes. This is partly because you have been able to study a broad range of disciplines that span the world of commerce. By my rough calculation, those doing a BCom will have attended 936 hours of lectures and tutorials, worked

outside class for at least 1872 hours (or at least should have!), and completed 50 hours of examinations and 48,000 words of non-examination assessment. However, I think you should also feel confident because what you have learned goes beyond the subject matter of economics, accounting, management, finance and actuarial studies. As the President of Yale University, Richard Levin put it in an address to a graduating class at Yale a decade ago, What you have learned the specific knowledge you have worked hard to acquire matters. What matters more is that you have learned how to learn. This was something that I reflected on this year when I to talked to a group of high-achieving high school students about what university education is like. I started out by saying that, in many ways, being at university is a continuation of their present education accumulating extra knowledge and skills in their chosen fields of study. However, I also suggested that university education offers more than this. It requires a student to engage in a learning process that is very different from what they would have experienced at school. I hope you will understand what I mean when I say that being at a university is a bit the same and a bit different from being at school. I realised what being at university meant to me and why I enjoyed it so much, when I studied Australian history in the second year of my Arts degree at the University of Melbourne. I had to write an essay on the Petrov conspiracy, an episode in the 1950s when Vladimir Petrov, a member of the Russian Embassy in Canberra, and his wife defected to Australia. At the suggestion of my essay adviser, Lloyd Robson, I wrote to those who had been members of the Commonwealth Parliament at the time of Petrovs defection, to find out if they could add to the documents I had been consulting. This gave me the opportunity to talk to former Senator Justin Byrne, known as the Father of the Senate. Byrne was fascinating person a POW in WWII and a member of Australian Senate for more than 30 years, with unique historical and political experience. I was spellbound as he gave a perspective of the historical background of Petrovs

defection the role of Russia in WWII, the rise of cold war sentiment in Australia and internationally, and to the event of the defection itself. Examining the motives and behaviour of many of those involved made this event come to life for me, while building the interview into my essay made me feel that I was constructing my own view of history. It is this process of independent discovery that university education facilitates, namely: knowing what are the important questions; using research techniques to find new evidence to answer questions; applying available evidence rigorously and critically to arrive at an answer; and then developing a way of integrating what you have discovered with what you might have concluded earlier. Ultimately, these are the skills in effect, learning how to learn that will be most valuable to you. By developing and applying them as you move into what I have called the looking-forward phase, you will be able to successfully contribute to your chosen field. There is one final thing that I would like to say about making the most of your talents and contributing to society. However, let me first confess that I am straying from an area where I have some expertise to what is dangerous territory for an economist: prediction. Economists, of course, are experts in giving a perfect explanation of why a prediction they made did not eventuate. Nevertheless, I will chance my arm and comment on why I believe that following your passion is so significant. For myself, my colleagues in Commerce at Melbourne, my friends and ex-students who I meet from time to time, we are most fulfilled by work we believe to be important. An example that comes to mind is the career of Charles Darwin. In his early twenties, like you, having just graduated from university, Darwin was offered the opportunity to travel as a gentleman companion on a ship undertaking a voyage to complete a survey of the southern part of South America. Initially, he was torn between becoming a country parson as expected by his family, and his passion for biology and collecting specimens. His family was concerned that this trip, to quote Darwin, would be disreputable to my character as a clergyman and that he

should never settle to a steady life thereafter. However, the passion manifested early in his life ultimately triumphed. Darwin recognised, as the biographer Janet Browne puts it, that this proposal was a dramatic opportunityto do the things he yearned to do, to see the world, and make something of himself. The voyage on the Beagle, which lasted 57 months from December 1831 to October 1836, was indeed to be the making of Charles Darwin and the making of much of modern science. Darwin is a great example of the importance of saying yes to challenges that initially may seem out of reach, but ones you know you would love to face. I know that many of you are already indeed following your passions in this way. Over the years, in the course of writing many references for exchange programs and scholarships, I have always been greatly impressed to see the range of parttime jobs and extra-curricular activities you and your fellow students are undertaking. These have included activities such as starting businesses in software development, importing and retailing; undertaking tutoring programs for refugees; producing websites and radio shows for welfare organisations; leading trips for young business leaders to developing countries; teaching English in places like China, Vietnam and Thailand; and doing volunteer work for human rights organisations. Let me conclude by congratulating you on your achievements at this University and by expressing the hope that you will continue to inspire those around you with your abilities and your willingness to be involved in promoting the well-being of society. I hope you find great satisfaction and fun in doing so. Top ^ An edited excerpt from his Occasional Address delivered at the graduation on 19 December 2006. Professor Jeff Borland is Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics of the University of Melbourne us data and actually made my paper complete.