G-20 nations agree to some financial regulations for global economy

Busan (South Korea), June 6 (ANI): Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has said that the finance ministers of G-20 countries in their joint communiqui have agreed to the need for 'some sort of financial regulations' to control the global economy.

Mukherjee revealed it while interacting with reporters after the conclusion of the G-20 summit of the finance ministers at Busan in South Korea on Saturday.

He informed that the question of levying taxes on the banking system was also raised during the meet.

"There is no universal acceptance of taxing the banking system. But everybody appreciated and they agreed that there should be some sort of financial regulation," said Mukherjee.

The summit at Busan also received recommendations from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Over the issue of global economic recession, Mukherjee said: "First issue, of course, was the sharing of perceptions of the global economic development. And, there the broad consensus was that the world economy is recovering faster than it was expected. But the troubles of the euro zone may cast its shadow over the quick recovery of Europe," Mukherjee stated.

He also said that there is a need to subsidise energy resources to a certain extent.

"The last issue, of course, was how to reduce the energy subsidies. There is a need but developing countries including India pointed out that there are some imperatives for which some amount of subsidy is needed. For, in case of India, there are nearly 250 to 300 million people who still do have access to the electricity even for their lighting purposes, they require kerosene and they are mainly poor people therefore some amount of subsidy is needed. But at the same time there is some amount of curbing of the subsidy," said Mukherjee.

At the G-20 meet, there was a broad consensus of views and the differences were narrowed down. The recommendations will be pressed for consideration of leaders of Toronto summit and these will be further discussed vis-'-vis the framework.

The working group will recommend a second phase that will be presented before the November summit and after getting the broad acceptance of the leaders; work on the second phase will commence.

The June 4-5 meeting in the port city of Busan was held in preparation for a summit of G20 leaders in Toronto on June 26-27.

Finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 wealthy and developing economies gathered in South Korea this week to discuss Europe's debt crisis, financial reforms and efforts to rebalance the global economy. By Ravi Shankar (ANI)