Regional Banknote of the Year Awards to Go Online for 2021

One of the highlights of the High Security Printing™ conferences each year are the regional awards for the best banknotes and ID documents. Thanks to COVID-19, no in-person HSP has been possible since the last event in Lisbon in March 2020, just before the world went into lockdown. And with a question mark still hanging over the resumption of conferences, at least for the rest of this year, Reconnaissance International, organiser of the HSP events, has decided to bridge the gap by holding a series of virtual awards instead.

There will be three categories for each of the Banknote of the Year awards for each region – Asia, EMEA and Latin America. And three separate virtual award ceremonies where the winners will be announced, all taking place on the same day but appropriate for the time zone of the relevant region.

The regional Banknote of the Year Award recognises outstanding achievement in the design, technical sophistication and security of a banknote or banknote series, the key judging criteria being that successful banknotes should combine visual artistry and high levels of technical and security sophistication, with considerable emphasis placed on reflecting the cultural heritage of the issuing country in the note, and the relevance of the overall design and symbolism to the issuing country.

There are three categories – Best New Banknote, Best New Banknote Series and Best New Commemorative Banknote. The nominations will be judged by:

• David Tidmarsh – Chairman of Currency Publications Ltd (co-publishers of Currency News)

• Mark Stevenson – President of the International Banknote Designers Association

• Lydia Yip – former Head of the Currency Division, Hong Kong Monetary Authority

• Lahcen Hadouni – former Director General of the Moroccan printworks Dar as-Sikkah

• Francisco Mandiola – former Managing Director of Casa de Moneda Chile.

Nominations can be made via hsp.awardsplatform.com. The deadline is 1 November 2021. The award ceremonies will be held in early December.