India To Face Difficult Task Of Bringing Countries Together As G-20 Chair, Says Chief IMF Economist

India will face the difficult task of bringing countries together as the G-20 Chair, IMF chief economist Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas has said.

IMF economist said that while G 20 is a really important initiative, it is still finding its footing. 

New Delhi: India will have to face the difficult task of bringing the countries together in some of the key issues as the chair of the Group of 20 or G-20 next year, Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas, the chief economist of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), said on Wednesday.

“One of the challenges for the G-20 right now, as we've seen, is of course how to deal with geo-economic fragmentation. And geo-economy fragmentation is just reflecting the fact that we've seen enormous tensions following the Russian invasion of Ukraine,” Gourinchas told PTI in an interview.

Gourinchas said, that in the current environment it is much harder to have discussions over "common goods" because of all the tension related to geopolitical considerations. However, one of the important objectives will be to keep the countries at the table, to keep the discussion going, keep progress being made on important issues, he added. 

Gourinchas said the group is the one place where there is governance representing the majority of the global economy coming together. It is not just a group of rich countries but something that has multiple voices. A lot of progress can be made by G-20, he said.

The IMF economist said that while G-20 is a really important initiative, it is still finding its footing. 

"We at the fund are somewhat frustrated with sometimes a lack of progress on the common framework,” he said.

He said that G 20 is an initiative in which issues like sustainability can be addressed by a global community, adding that that is something which the IMF is looking at very closely. At a venue like the G-20, multilateralism can have discussions on common goods and make progress and common goods. 

“So what are the common goods where progress could be made? Prominent among those include the issue of climate change and debt sustainability.

Talking about digitalisation, he said that it is very much at the forefront, “The whole issue of how the emergence of digital currencies, crypto assets, how is this going to stabilise, destabilise? How should we be doing?

There are enormous externalities at the global level regarding the emergence of these new instruments. So how are we as a global community should we organise this space,” he said.

“Should we regulate it? How should it be regulated? The cross-border aspect is going to be very important. So that's obviously a common good,” Gourinchas said.