Spring Meetings Redux!

IMF Blog, April 23, 2015

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Event: 2015 Spring Meetings of the IMF and World Bank.
Attendance among civil society and parliamentarians: "500 or so civil society participants and 200 members of parliament" attended the meetings.
Central questions in the air: whether the global economy would avoid the “new mediocre” becoming the “new reality,” whether Greece would reach agreement with its creditors, and whether there would be progress on IMF governance reform.

Key international milestones referenced for 2015:
- Financing for Development conference in Addis Ababa in July.
- United Nations Heads of State Summit in New York in September.
- Climate talks in Paris in December.
Concern from civil society about sufficiency of international financing to meet needs of the poor.
Oxfam recommendation: World Bank and IMF should examine how sustainable development goals could be financed by “unlocking the enormous potential resources from an improved international tax system”.
Parliamentary debate focus: “What can we do at the national level to influence these international talks”?

Central question: Would citizens, parliaments, and governments take the actions needed to reach agreement by December?
Quote from Amy Larkin (Global Agenda Council on Climate Change): “pollution can no longer be free and can no longer be subsidized.”
IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde solicited a show of hands as to which parliaments are working on reforms to reduce energy subsidies; only "a quarter raised their hands".
Lagarde’s message to parliaments and ministers on fossil fuels: “Price it Right!”

Donor commitments welcomed by Oxfam: contributions by UK and Germany, and Mexico to the IMF’s Catastrophe, Containment and Relief Trust.
Jubilee USA’s Eric LeComte praised the IMF’s agility in setting up a “global safety net for the world’s poorest countries.”
IMF action: providing "$100 million in debt relief to the three Ebola-affected countries."
LeComte: "We need structures that help the most vulnerable. The IMF's debt relief fund is a good example and a good start."

Strong participation by women MPs and women civil society representatives led to gender surfacing in discussions.
Parliamentary question from Pakistan MP: should women’s housework be counted towards GDP?
IMF research referenced: "Women, Work and the Economy" and "Fair play".
Civil society concern (Gulalai Ismail, Awake Girls): interest in IMF consideration of issues surrounding women’s empowerment.

Described as a "burning issue".
Oxfam warning: on current trends, "the world’s one percent will own more than anyone else in the world."
Calls for IMF to integrate inequality into operations repeated by Bretton Woods Project’s Sargon Nissan and the ITUC’s Peter Bakvis; IMF work on this is "underway."

Significant discussion on IMF governance, including "the lack of progress on quota reform."
Debate over the creation of the new Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank and implications for a “new multilateralism.”
Sentiment: emerging markets and developing countries must have greater weight and voice in global economic institutions, including the IMF, to reflect "the new and dynamic centers of political and economic gravity that are emerging."

Event: Global Citizen Earth Day on the National Mall.
Attendance: "over a quarter million people."
Character: musicians, policy makers, and activists pledging action to solve climate change and end extreme poverty.
Quote from Lagarde to the crowd: “At the IMF, 188 Ministers of Finance and Governors of Central Banks heard a big noise, and it was you. I’m here to give you a piece of good news—because they heard you, they are committed to ending poverty and financing development”—and the crowds roared back.

Source: Spring Meetings Redux!, Sabina Bhatia, April 23, 2015.