 "At G20 conference, FM bats for strengthening effectiveness of FATF, IMF")
In the run up to assuming the G20 presidency in 2023, India is working towards identifying the "vacuum areas" in international policy coordination, including strengthening the effectiveness of institutions like FATF and IMF, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Wednesday.
Speaking at ICRIER's 13th Annual International G20 Conference, Sitharaman said the G20 presidency would provide an excellent platform for India to voice its vision regarding the future reflecting sustainability, inclusiveness, innovation and justice.
Stating that the road to India's 2023 presidency is interesting and challenging, she said, "We are working towards identifying the vacuum areas in international policy coordination."
"These could be in the area of building resilience or reforming long-awaited systems or in creating new effective global institutions or even strengthening the mandate, reach and effectiveness of the existing ones such as FATF (Financial Action Task Force) and also the IMF (International Monetary Fund)," she noted.
Emerging market economies will hold the G20 presidency till 2025, starting with Indonesia in 2022 and India in 2023.
"The themes and priorities that india places before the G20 shall reflect those issues wherein advanced and emerging market economies can jointly work for enabling G20 to play a more constructive role in global policy discourse, reaffirm the importance of multilateral cooperation, ensure multilateralism leads to expansion of opportunities as well as give direction to G20 to reach out to global community beyond the G20 membership and work towards realistic ambition," she said.
To a query on any likely impact of US 'taper tantrum' on India, Sitharaman said India has learnt its lessons from the last taper tantrum which led it to being included among the 'fragile five' economies.
"Together with RBI we are definitely keeping a watch. Debt sustainability is an issue which I'm sure every global forum will have to address and talk," she said.
The taper tantrum phenomenon refers to the 2013 collective reactionary response that triggered a spike in US treasury yields, after investors learned that the US Federal Reserve was slowly putting brakes on its quantitative easing (QE) programme. This led to a surge in inflation to high double digits emerging economies.