The Institute of Cost and Management Accountants of Pakistan (ICMAP) has introduced the new syllabus which will be effective from this month", said ICMAP President Mohammad Rafi here on Saturday.
Speaking at a press conference, he said the new ICMAP syllabus would ensure wider international recognition, acceptance and applications of institute education and professional training process and is comparable with the curricula of leading management accounting bodies of the world.
The ICMAP president hoped that the new syllabus would equip the students with up-graded skills and competencies demanded by the users of their services.
He said the education system has been rehashed to line it up with the improvements emerging in the accounting area, and the work experience has been made compulsory as an integral part of the process.
Rafi said it has been continuous effort to strength education and professional training to ICMAP students because they are future of the management accountancy profession. While restructuring the syllabus the emphasis was laid on the requirements of all other stakeholders.
He said that hectic efforts are involved in designing of new syllabus as the survey was conducted to elicit the opinion of market people and all stakeholders to make it according to the needs of the new era.
Under the new syllabus scheme, now students would be required to have a minimum of six months of work experience for eligibility to get their two-year post-graduate certificate in cost and management accounting and one-year work experience to get cost and management accounting final certificate, said the ICMAP president. Also, a computer-based distant learning programme has received assent of the council in principle, he added.
Rafi described the accounting practices in the country are highly qualitative as these are mostly based on international accounting standards, saying that Pakistan has an edge on other countries of the region due to quality products of accounting institutes of the country.
ICMAP Council Member Badruddin Fakhri, who has also been the president of the Institute, briefed the newsmen about new internet-based distant learning programme. Under this programme, lectures would be available on the CDs as well as provision of a study pack to the students and MCOs at the end of each chapter, he added.
Fakhri pointed out that an important element of this programme is that the student can study at his own convenience.
Highlighting the salient features of the new syllabus, ICMAP Director (Edu) Irfan Hassan said it is in line with IFAC international education standards guidelines.
The number of papers has also been reduced to 21 from 23, while new courses have been introduced with the restructuring of some old ones.