"The opening ceremony and the main session will take place at the Madrid Stock Exchange," said Abdullah Turkistani, director of Islamic Economic Research Center of King Abdulaziz University, which will organize the conference in association with IE University's Center for Islamic Economics and Finance (CIEF).

Speaking to Arab News, Turkistani said about 30 Islamic finance experts from Saudi Arabia, Spain, Britain, France, Germany, India and other countries would take part in the conference, which also aims at improving cooperation between business and academic institutions in Saudi Arabia and Spain.

Turkistani and other KAU professors met with Rafael Puyol Antolin, president of IE university, and Jose Luis Estevez, director of CIEF, at the Jeddah university on Saturday and discussed ways of making the Madrid conference a big success. "We have also discussed its topics and main speakers," he added.

He hoped that the opening of the conference at Madrid Stock Exchange would draw the attention of not only business leaders but also the general public in the country. The conference is organized by IE Business School, which is the third best in Europe and sixth best in the whole world, he pointed out.

The CIEF at IE Business School was established last year with the support of KAU, which assists the IE center by providing qualified teachers and conducting specialized courses in Islamic finance and economics. "KAU and IE are also working on certification of Islamic finance professionals," Turkistani said.

The CIEF chief Estevez said the conference would have four workshops on: Public and private entities and new technologies; Islamic finance products and laws; banking and insurance; and introduction to Islamic finance.

"Each workshop will be led by two experts; a Spanish or European and a Saudi and will be attended by 25-30 delegates," Estevez said. "It will be quite different from other conferences. It will be a kind of working conference," he said, adding that a book would be published containing the conferences' discussions.

Estevez is optimistic that the conference will play a big role in increasing awareness of Islamic finance in the West and contribute to expanding Islamic finance in the country. The Spanish academic highlighted the growing prospects of Islamic finance in the West, especially in providing much needed funds, and meeting the financial requirements of increasing Muslim population.

Spelling out Spain's strong points with regard to Islamic finance, Ahmed Beloufi, assistant professor and researcher at the KAU center, said the country was the fifth largest economy in Europe and had more than a million Muslims among its population. "Financial exclusion of Muslims will not serve the economy of any country," he said and urged non-Muslim countries to introduce interest-free financial products to attract Muslims funds. He also called for strengthening Islamic finance centers in Bahrain, Sudan and Malaysia.