The SET Chairman, Mr. Chavalit Thanachanan, as a chairman of the Sub-Committee on Education and Public Relations for Corporate Governance of Thailand disclosed that, in order to continuously promote good corporate governance, the SET Board of Governors passed a resolution to set aside a budget for organizing a training program "Directors Accreditation Program" (DAP) for listed companies' directors aiming at enhancing understanding their roles, responsibilities and accountability to shareholders with an objective to increase their companies' value in the long run.
"The SET has discussed with the Thai Institute of Directors (IOD) about holding a new program, "Directors Accreditation Program" (DAP), for listed companies' directors. The program will require approximately 10 million baht and targets 2,000 directors. This will increase the number of directors knowledgeable about the good directors' roles and responsibilities according to the good governance principles, then further disseminate this widely within their organizations," Mr. Chavalit said.
The DAP Program is a short-term course lasting only seven hours, divided into two half-day training sessions that are specially designed for the directors of listed companies with limited time. The program will cover the essentials for being a director of listed companies as well as the rules and practices that they should know, which will benefit their performance. This year the program can accommodate 350 participants all of whom will be fully subsidized from the SET.
Mr. Chavalit also said that: "Previously the SET Board has approved a budget worth 41 million baht to subsidize a five-and-a-half day program--Directors Certification Program (DCP). This program is also intended to promote greater understanding about the roles of directors. The IOD has been organizing the course for listed companies and member companies since 2002."
The initial DAP program will be available for only five groups of participants, making it accommodate 350 individuals in total. These first five groups will be trained on August 28-29, September 22-23, October 15-16, November 10-11, and December 15-16, 2003. Directors interested in joining the DAP program can apply for free. Moreover, after completion of the course, they will be accredited and waived for a shorter training period in the DCP program, from five and a half days to four and a half days. The SET will still subsidize 75% of the expenses of the DCP program, but this will be limited to only two persons per company.
Since there are limited seats, directors interested in this free DAP program should urgently inform the IOD at Tel: 0-2264-0870 by July 31, 2003. For more information, please see http://www.set.or.th/downloa/bj46_28.pdf.
