International and Russian Audit Standards to be Single

On 11 December 2013 the National Organization for Financial Accounting and Reporting Standards (the NOFA Foundation) conducted a press-breakfast on the signing of agreement between the NOFA Foundation and the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) about the official translation of the International Standards of Auditing (ISA) into the Russian language.

As Askold Birin, FBK Partner, international reporting department director and Chairman of the NOFA Foundation National Accounting Standards Board, noted the signing of agreement is an important step on the way of accounting area harmonization and transition of the Russian business to a common global language of communication.

The International Standards of Auditing (ISA) are a widely recognized set of norms and rules, including ethical, which the auditor should be guided by in his/her professional activity. As of today the ISA in Russia have no official status; the national standards of auditing are in use, which, though ISA-driven, are continually in the role of “catching up with”. And the ISA are a more holistic and harmonious system of rules. Besides, when assuring the company’s official reporting according to the IFRS the auditor has to produce two auditor’s conclusions – according to the national and international standards of auditing – or to reflect the two approaches in one conclusion, which is hypothetically fraught with variant reading.
“We hope that the ISA official translation will be followed with their official recognition,” remarks Askold Birin, Chairman of the NOFA Foundation National Accounting Standards Board. “That will allow our country to follow the mainstream of global innovations in the field of standards of auditing”. 

Signing of the agreement is, in a sense, the “culmination of Foundation activity” that throughout its 10-years history has been acting as the platform for concordance of interests of both the reporting compilers and those who check it and those who use it, noted Irina Krasilnikova, the NOFA Foundation director. In her opinion, the translation and implementation of ISA in Russia can make another stimulus for integration processes in the CIS area. At the meeting of the CIS Executive Committee Accounting Coordination Panel in October 2012 under discussion was the issue of unification of translations of the auditing and accounting standards.
In accordance with the IFAC agreement in the next 15 months the NOFA Foundation will have to translate into Russia over 1500 pages of the text of Guide on International Standards of quality control, auditing, surveys and other assurance and related services. Andrey Poselskiy, deputy chair of the NOFA Foundation National Accounting Standards Board, said that the work of translating the ISA would be on the same principle as the IFRS translation, which the NOFA Foundation has been carrying out since October 2012 amenably to the agreement signed with the Foundation on the International Accounting Standards. “It is very important that within the scope of this effort the translations of ISA and IFRS will be unified”, noted the expert.

The National Organization for Financial Accounting and Reporting Standards (the NOFA Foundation) is a non-governmental organization associating specialists of all professions related to the preparation, auditing and using the financial reporting information as well as the representatives of the regulating authorities.
By RF Government regulation the NOFA Foundation was vested with the right of expertise for the applicability of the International Financial Reporting Standards and IFRS clarifications on the territory of Russia. In agreement with the International Accounting Standards Board the NOFA Foundation was vested the right to do the IFRS official translation into Russian.