World Bank-IMF call for use of clean energy

Washington, Apr 24 (UNI) The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have jointly proposed a plan to encourage developing countries to use clean energy for their growing development needs.

Though the World Bank sought to encourage them to choose 'clean, efficient energy sources' it did not spell out the money required to be invested or what will be its share in this venture.

Developing countries, however, appeared favourably inclined to the recent British proposal, calling upon developed nations to float a clean energy project with an initial investment of 20 billion dollars.

The two-day World Bank-IMF annual spring meeting that ended here last night proposed reforms to better respond to crises in a rapidly changing global economy.

These included increasing the voice of emerging market countries in the Fund's decision-making process and overhauling its economic surveillance mechanism.

India voiced the concerns of the developing countries pertaining to the financing of the proposed clean energy initiative.

The IMF appeared hopeful of continuing growth for at least the next couple of years. What worried the monetary institution most was that with the growth had come some risks, including massive trade imbalances and high oil prices.

British Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown, who chaired the IMF's steering committee, said, ''The IMF should monitor in future more deeply -- not just country policies but the linkages and spillover effects of one country's policies on others in the global economy.'' Mr Brown added that the global economy had undergone rapid changes in recent years, and so too, must the 61-year-old IMF.

Earlier, at a meeting of the Development Committee, India's Economic Affairs Secretary A K Jha said, the policy-making body of the World Bank had said the proposed initiative should not result in imposition of ''new rules of the game or any additional financial burden, just when a number of developing countries are poised to increase their rates of growth and lift their citizens out of poverty.'' Mr Jha hoped that the Bank would elaborate the details of the new financing mechanism, along with its operational implications, by its next annual meeting scheduled for September next.

India wants that the sequencing should be carefully thought through so that introduction of new technologies is matched closely with availability of additional financing, he added.

Earlier, the meeting also approved a debt relief plan for 17 African and Latin-American countries that could total 37 billion dollers over 40 years.

World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz said two-thirds of the bank members had approved the plan, the implication of which is that the Bank could set in motion the process of writing of debts in July.

The 17 countries now eligible for World Bank debt relief are Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Honduras, Madagascar, Mali, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.

UNI XC PV KN1258