## Policy Actions Can Reinforce Growth Progress in Many G20 Economies

_IMF Blog, November 19, 2025_

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**Canonical URL:** [Policy Actions Can Reinforce Growth Progress in Many G20 Economies](https://www.imf.org/en/blogs/articles/2025/11/19/policy-actions-can-reinforce-growth-progress-in-many-g20-economies)

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## Bibliographic details
- Authors: Nicolas Fernandez-Arias, Shushanik Hakobyan
- Published: November 19, 2025

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### Overview and context
- Since the Group of Twenty’s foundational Pittsburgh conference in 2009, progress toward its goal of strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth has been modest.
- Medium-term growth prospects for the G20 have moderated to just 2.9 percent, described as the weakest since the global financial crisis.
- G20 members account for about 85 percent of global economic output.
- Public debt rose to a record 102 percent of GDP last year.
- Excessive external imbalances are widening again.

### Recent positive developments
- A survey of IMF country teams indicates many G20 economies made progress toward stronger growth, including more than half of emerging market economies.
- Improvement has been substantial in some cases, such as Germany, where growth momentum was supported by reforms to fiscal rules.
- Falling inflation and fiscal consolidation efforts are improving the sustainability of growth for most G20 advanced economies and half of the European Union.

### Outstanding weaknesses: balanced and inclusive growth
- Balanced growth remains elusive across the G20:
  - Moderate deterioration was assessed in China and the United States because of widening excess current account balances.
- Inclusive growth improved only slightly, particularly in G20 advanced economies and in the African Union (which joined the group in 2023).

### Policy priorities and reform sequencing
- Smart fiscal policy is central: governments need to rebuild fiscal buffers to contain rising debt while meeting growing spending needs.
- Fundamental economic (structural) reforms are needed to aid domestic rebalancing and foster stronger growth.
- IMF country teams identified measures with the highest expected growth impact to guide prioritization and sequencing:
  - Reforms to labor market institutions consistently ranked among the highest-impact measures across the G20 and in the European Union.
  - Improved fiscal policies and business regulations also consistently ranked highly.
  - For African Union members, the largest potential gains lie in foundational governance improvements and fiscal reforms.

### Simulated impacts of concerted reform and macroeconomic policies
- Implementing the identified highest-impact structural reforms, alongside recommended macroeconomic policies, could raise growth across the group by about 7 percentage points cumulatively over the next decade.
  - This cumulative gain would benefit emerging market economies the most.
- Debt burdens would decline by more than 8 percentage points of GDP within five years for countries with limited fiscal space, reflecting the combined impact of recommended fiscal adjustments and structural reforms.
- Concerted reform efforts would also support domestic rebalancing by helping narrow current account balances, with large improvements possible for both major surplus and deficit economies.

*This blog is based on the 2025 G20 Report on Strong, Sustainable, Balanced, and Inclusive Growth, prepared by IMF staff. For additional information, see also the new SSBIG dashboard.*

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## Content in this bundle

- **G20 Report on Strong, Sustainable, Balanced, and Inclusive Growth.**
  - [G20 Report on Strong, Sustainable, Balanced, and Inclusive Growth. (Markdown version)](/-/media/files/research/imf-and-g20/2025/g20-report-on-strong-sustainable-balanced-and-inclusive-growth.pdf.md){rel="alternate" type="text/markdown"}
  - [G20 Report on Strong, Sustainable, Balanced, and Inclusive Growth. (PDF)](/-/media/files/research/imf-and-g20/2025/g20-report-on-strong-sustainable-balanced-and-inclusive-growth.pdf){rel="external" type="application/pdf"}

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## References

- [are widening again](https://www.imf.org/en/publications/esr/issues/2025/07/22/external-sector-report-2025)
- [SSBIG dashboard](https://data.imf.org/en/dashboards/ssbig%20dashboard)

_Source: https://www.imf.org/en/blogs/articles/2025/11/19/policy-actions-can-reinforce-growth-progress-in-many-g20-economies_