Will play critical role on issues like climate change, debt and digital transition: IMF MD Georgieva and World Bank Prez Banga

The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund will play a critical role in helping countries confront economic, geopolitical and climate change challenges, said the heads of both institutions in a release issued on Thursday.

“The Bretton Woods institutions have a critical role to play to help member countries address the challenges and leverage the opportunities, working closely together and with partners,” said Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, and Ajay Banga, President of the World Bank in a joint statement.

The institutions stated that the world economy has slowed, with the medium-term outlook at the lowest in three decades. Moreover, rapid technological changes create new challenges and opportunities.


“With well-designed and appropriately sequenced reforms, the digital and green transitions can bring tremendous economic, social and environmental gains and add to welfare and prosperity,” the statement read.

On the climate change front, the international organisations stated that they will formalise the regular meetings of the new Bank-Fund Climate Advisory Group.

“The group will meet every two months to discuss global and country-level engagements, including the results of CCDRs, country-level climate analytical work, and the pipeline of key projects and policy-based lending (World Bank’s DPLs and Fund’s RST engagements),” it said.

“We will also incorporate climate considerations in our ongoing work on debt sustainability, including through the revised joint Low Income Country Debt Sustainability Framework,” according to the statement.

The statement also focused on the work done by both bodies on debt management and digital transition.

“We will step up our joint work to help countries increase the effectiveness of revenue collection and expenditure systems in governments… support the implementation of the G20 Roadmap to enhance cross-border payments, and ensure that payment innovations spur growth, poverty reduction and job creation.”

The statement comes with a day to go for the G20 Leaders Summit in New Delhi. The G20 leaders have reforms of multilateral development banks on the agenda, with the developing nations demanding more representation for the Global South.

The IMF, along with G20’s Financial Stability Board, on Thursday, also brought out a paper on crypto assets, which talks about collaboration between the IMF, the World Bank and other international institutions for developing regulations on crypto assets and regulatory framework.