Finance ministers agree to bolster their ability to manage debt

Finance ministers from Commonwealth African and Caribbean countries have committed their governments to improving legal and financial frameworks in the wake of the current global economic crisis.

During a meeting at the World Bank’s headquarters in Washington DC on 22 April 2009, they agreed that a major effort was needed to strengthen their abilities to manage growing debts.

Their commitments include ensuring a legal framework is in place so that staff dealing with debt management have a clear mandate to work towards, and also recruiting and training professional staff in order to reduce dependency on help from overseas.

For these and other commitments to be met, ministers called on donors and international institutions like the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) to provide stronger financial and training support. They stressed that each country should be actively involved in implementing any agreed policies so that they become increasingly self-reliant as opposed to having to call on international expertise to bail them out.

This meeting of finance ministers follows the G20 summit earlier this month where world leaders met in London and agreed to pump US$1 trillion into the ailing global economy.

Commonwealth finance ministers welcomed this and other commitments made by the G20 leaders. However, they emphasised the importance of donors, such as the IMF, delivering fully on the commitments made in London and also of providing additional finance where required.

Finance ministers or their representatives from Cameroon, The Gambia, Ghana, Guyana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, and Zambia were present at the meeting.