IACA Awards for COVID Measures

The International Association of Currency Affairs (IACA) 2021 award scheme, which recognises the measures developed by organisations across the currency community to deal with, respond to and mitigate the impacts of COVID, has received eight nominations.

IACA members are now voting on the submissions, all of which will be presented, and the winners announced, at a virtual awards ceremony on 24 September.

Below is a summary of the nominations. More details of each will be provided in subsequent issues of Currency News™.

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas – Cash Service Alliance

Owing to the challenge of transporting cash during lockdowns and the need to maintain the provision of cash to the public, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas launched the Cash Service Alliance (CSA), in partnership with the Bankers Association of the Philippines.

The CSA enables banks to enter into a mutually beneficial agreement to service requirements for fit Philippine currency of other banks from their available cash holdings. Prior to then, banks withdraw all their fit currency requirements from the BSP.

In October 2020, the BSP provided an online system to facilitate the direct exchange of fit currency among banks. From then until May 2021, 147 million fit notes were sourced from the CSA, representing 72% in value and 55% in volume of banks’ fit currency requirements.

According to the BSP, the CSA has ensured that proper and secured procedures are observed, strengthened cooperation among banks and enabled their proactive role in currency circulation management, and led to the undisrupted supply and efficient distribution of fit currency during the pandemic.

Currency Research – COVID-19 Educational Programming

With face-to-face meetings, business travel and conferences grinding to a halt, Currency Research quickly created a new infrastructure to support the industry, including a sequence of informational virtual seminars, bringing together leading industry experts to share information on COVID-19 and payments.

De La Rue – Next Generation Business Continuity Planning

When COVID-19 emerged, De La Rue adapted its pandemic response plan to allow a more agile response across the business. Each site developed specific requirements and responsibilities for employees, including communication trigger points.

New digital and security protocols were quickly implemented for those working from home, whilst new processes, procedures and shift patterns were set up for manufacturing staff.

Thanks to the plan, De La Rue says it experienced a lower than average (by country) rate of infection from COVID- 19 cases, was able to meet manufacturing commitments and maintain overall business productivity.

HUMANIA

HUMANIA is an umbrella initiative to bring together the currency community to support post COVID recovery through the medium of banknotes. The first project has involved a series of banknote designs themed around messages of hope and recovery that, once banknoteised, will be used to raise funds for charity.

Koenig & Bauer Banknote Solutions – Visual PressSupport

Unable to send its technicians to customers’ sites for support and maintenance, Koenig & Bauer has implemented Visual PressSupport, a bidirectional video link based on a highly secure SaaS platform. It enables remote maintenance engineers to see exactly what the operator or service technician at the press can see, and observe relevant press functions and processes as moving images.

KURZ – Digital Design and Origination Approval Process

KURZ has introduced a new digital process for design and origination approval in which design files and visualisations are transmitted to the customer by a secure messaging system. Once approved, a first master shim is produced, with highly advanced digital animations illustrating how a security feature produced with the master shim will look. This can be used as the basis for approving the master shim, in place of the physical shim.

Oberthur Fidicuiare – BIOGUARD

BIOGUARD is a substrate with an anti-bacterial and anti-fungus treatment that has already been proven effective on millions of bills in circulation. With the arrival of the pandemic, Oberthur Fiduciaire’s R&D teams added anti-virus properties to the formulation. The first version of this new solution was launched in March 2020.

The results against SARS-COV2 showed that BIOGUARD offers a significant anti-viral protection, specifically a reduction of the viral load of 99.95% on BIOGUARD paper and of 99% with BIOGUARD varnishing.

Royal Canadian Mint – The Royal Canadian Mint Recognition Medal

The Royal Canadian Mint repurposed the by-product of bi-metallic coin manufacturing and applied pulsating technology to plated material to produce the Royal Canadian Mint’s Recognition Medal.

The project was unique on two counts.

First was the pulsating technology itself, formed by thousands of micro-mirrors arrayed with specific and different angles, to reflect light in a way that creates movement. Second was that it was a pure charitable fundraising product, with 100% of net proceeds were donated to charity.