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Canada is one of the original members of the International Monetary Fund, having joined it on December 27, 1945. [1] It has a quota of 11,023.9 million SDRs and 11,698 votes, 2.31% of the total IMF quota and votes, ranking the 9th of all. Canada has been represented on the IMF Board of Governors by Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland since 2020. [2] Canada elects an Executive Director on the fund's Executive Board with Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Ireland, Bahamas, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Philip John Jennings is the elected alternate director. [3] Canada is the only G7 country that represents both lenders (Canada and Ireland) and borrowers (the Caribbean) at the IMF.
Canada has no loan agreements with the IMF, and has had no transactions with the Fund since January 1, 1984. [4]
Canada is one of very few countries represented on the Boards of Directors of all the regional development banks: the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) and the African Development Bank (AfDB).
Canada also joined the Caribbean Regional Technical Assistance Center (CARTAC), which is associated with the IMF, and contributed US$16,956,673 to the regional technical assistance centers as of April 30, 2021. Canada participated in the green budgeting webinar with DPs, the United Nations Development Program, and the IMF in analyzing the Caribbean regional data in March, 2021. CARTAC launched a new debt management program 2021, funded by the government of Canada, it makes available dedicated and substantial resources for capacity building in debt management. [5]
Canada contributed to the Pacific Financial Technical Assistance Center (PFTAC), the first regional technical assistance center of the IMF, US$1,136,191 for the fifth phase from November 1, 2016 to April 30, 2021. [6]
Canada used to be one of the largest contributors to the IMF’s Institute for Capacity Development, which provides capacity development and training to officials in member countries. Canada had helped to build the IMF a better institution by arming the staff with better macroeconomic and financial management skills and knowledge. [7] It is still in the list of top 10 partners for IMF Capacity Development from 2019 to 2021, participating in funds like the Anti–Money Laundering/Combating the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT III) and Somalia Country Fund. [8] Canada also joined Pacific Financial Technical Assistance Center (PFTAC) to promote macro-financial stability in the Pacific Island countries (PICs) through a program of technical assistance and training. [9]
Besides assistance in personnel training, Canada also worked on information-sharing program in the CARTAC to raise the efficiency in setting up the project and rule out duplication. [5]
Finance Canada and CIDA also held bi-annual meetings with civil society prior to the Bank and IMF Spring and Fall meetings. These meetings were an important venue for exchanging opinions on a variety of issues. [10]
Canada has raised its main interest rate to 2.75% during the pandemic as a tactic to tackle inflation that has risen to 7.7%. [11] [12] The Governing Council continued to predict ongoing increase on the interest rate due to global economics and inflation. [12] The IMF estimates that without Canada’s COVID-19 economic response, “real output would have declined by an additional 7.8 percentage points in 2020 and the unemployment rate would have been 3.2 percentage points higher.” [13]
In the year of 2020, the IMF launched a COVID-19 Crisis Capacity Development Initiative to raise special and urgent fund for the countries struggling with the monetary shortage caused by the pandemic. The Initiative is currently funded by Japan, Germany, China, South Korea, Canada, Belgium, Spain, Singapore, and Switzerland, reaching 40 million dollars. The Initiative also linked to other important global themes, namely: tax policy and inclusive growth; supporting a green recovery; digitalization and financial access; debt management and revenue mobilization; and transparency and accountability in emergency response. [14] [15]
At the regional level, the Caribbean Community has launched a Caribbean Economic Recovery and Transformation Plan to develop a financing strategy to support post-pandemic investment needs. The IMF is partnering with the broader international community to help small developing countries to confront the challenges. The region could also harness its “blue economy” potential (sustainable use of ocean resources) by increasing investment in shipping, fisheries, and aquaculture. Countries should continue to pursue technological innovation, to improve efficiency, reduce cross-border transfers costs, and facilitate international trade. [16]
The IMF observed that the Government of Canada’s recovery plan is a welcome step. [17]
The economy of Ecuador is the eighth largest in Latin America and the 69th largest in the world by total GDP. Ecuador's economy is based on the export of oil, bananas, shrimp, gold, other primary agricultural products and money transfers from Ecuadorian emigrants employed abroad. In 2017, remittances constituted 2.7% of country's GDP. The total trade amounted to 42% of the Ecuador's GDP in 2017.
The economy of El Salvador has experienced relatively low rates of GDP growth, in comparison to other developing countries. Rates have not risen above the low single digits in nearly two decades – part of a broader environment of macroeconomic instability which the integration of the United States dollar has done little to improve. One problem that the Salvadoran economy faces is the inequality in the distribution of income. In 2011, El Salvador had a Gini Coefficient of .485, which although similar to that of the United States, leaves 37.8% of the population below the poverty line, due to lower aggregate income. The richest 10% of the population receives approximately 15 times the income of the poorest 40%.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is an agency of the United Nations, and an international financial institution, headquartered in Washington, D.C., consisting of 190 countries. Its stated mission is "working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world." Formed in 1944, started on 27 December 1945, at the Bretton Woods Conference primarily by the ideas of Harry Dexter White and John Maynard Keynes, it came into formal existence in 1945 with 29 member countries and the goal of reconstructing the international monetary system. It now plays a central role in the management of balance of payments difficulties and international financial crises. Countries contribute funds to a pool through a quota system from which countries experiencing balance of payments problems can borrow money. As of 2016, the fund had XDR 477 billion.
Special drawing rights (SDRs) are supplementary foreign exchange reserve assets defined and maintained by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). SDRs are units of account for the IMF, and not a currency per se. They represent a claim to currency held by IMF member countries for which they may be exchanged. SDRs were created in 1969 to supplement a shortfall of preferred foreign exchange reserve assets, namely gold and U.S. dollars. The ISO 4217 currency code for special drawing rights is XDR and the numeric code is 960.
The economy of the European Union is the joint economy of the member states of the European Union (EU). It is the third largest economy in the world in nominal terms, after the United States and China, and the third one in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, after China and the United States. The European Union's GDP was estimated to be around $17.9 trillion (nominal) in 2020, representing around one sixth of the global economy.
The G20 or Group of Twenty is an intergovernmental forum comprising 19 countries and the European Union (EU). It works to address major issues related to the global economy, such as international financial stability, climate change mitigation, and sustainable development.
The Asia/Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG) is a FATF style regional inter-governmental (international) body, the members of which are committed to implement international standards against money laundering (AML), the financing of terrorism (CTF) and financing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. APG was founded in 1997 in Bangkok, Thailand, and currently consists of 41 member jurisdictions in the Asia-Pacific region and a number of observer jurisdictions and international/regional observer organisations.
Nemat Talaat Shafik, Baroness Shafik,, known as Minouche Shafik, is an Egyptian-born British-American economist who has been serving as the Director of the London School of Economics since September 2017.
Linah Kelebogile Mohohlo was a Botswana banker and university chancellor. She was the first female Governor of the Bank of Botswana from 1999 to 2016. She was also the first female Chancellor of the University of Botswana, serving from 2017 to 2021.
The Republic of Kiribati's per capita Gross National Product of US$1,420 (2010) makes it the poorest country in Oceania. Phosphates had been profitably exported from Banaba Island since the turn of the 20th century, but the deposits were exhausted in 1979. The economy now depends on foreign assistance and revenue from fishing licenses to finance its imports and development budget.
Thailand joined the IMF on May 3, 1949 and has been the recipient of numerous IMF programs, most notably in its role as the source of contagion in the 1997 Asian financial crisis. Thailand currently has a quota of 3,211.9 million SDR's, which gives it the second most voting power in its constituency after Turkey. The IMF opened a technical assistance office in Thailand in 2012 to provide technical assistance and training to the Lao PDR and the Republic of the Union of Myanmar.
The World Bank Group is a family of five international organizations that has provided leveraged loans and monetary assistance to the Central American country of Honduras in order to assist with the funding of critical tasks needed to ensure security of Honduran access to financing, expansion of social program coverage, and rural development. The country is the second poorest in Central America and its high poverty rate of 66% in 2016 has prompted an increased focus on the importance of diversification of rural income sources, quality education, and targeted social programs as a way of spurring economic growth.
Geoffrey William Seiji Okamoto is an American economist and government official who served as First Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund "IMF", the IMF's number 2 position. Okamoto previously served as the Acting Assistant Secretary for International Finance and Development in the United States Department of the Treasury. He was nominated for this position on January 1, 2019, by the White House and was never confirmed by the United States Congress. He previously served as Acting Assistant Secretary for International Markets and Investment, for which he was also not confirmed.
Sustainable Development Goal 17 is about "partnerships for the goals." One of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals established by the United Nations in 2015, the official wording is: "Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development". The Goal has 17 targets to be achieved by 2030, broken down into five categories: finance, technology, capacity building, trade and systemic issues. Progress towards targets will be measured by 25 indicators.
Maxwell Opoku-Afari is a Ghanaian economist and currently the First Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana. He was appointed to this position on August 7, 2017.
Sri Lanka joined the International Monetary Fund on August 29, 1950. Since June 1965, Sri Lanka has taken 16 loans from the IMF, with a total value of 3,586,000,000 SDR's. The most recent of these loans was agreed to in June 2016, with an agreed total of 1,070,780 SDR's, and 715,230,000 SDR's being withdrawn. Of this total, 715,230,000 SDR's remain outstanding.
Japan joined the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on August 13, 1952. Since then, Japan has sustained a stable relationship with the IMF and supported the Fund's various work including analysis, policy advice, financial assistance, and notably technical assistance support, or capacity development. Technical assistance programs provided opportunities to train officials from developing countries in making economic policies with a regional focus on Asia-Pacific area. Japan promoted the establishment of the Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific (OAP), which works as the outpost of the IMF in the Asia-Pacific region, keeping member countries updated with the IMF policies and economic data. Japan also operated two scholarship programs to encourage the advanced study of macroeconomy and prepare officials from the Aisa-Pacific region for policy making.
Papua New Guinea joined the International Monetary Fund on October 9th 1975, one day before uniting with the United Nations. However, still in the early stages of independence which they gained on September 16th, 1975, Papua New Guinea found itself in the face of turmoil due to political and economic mismanagement. Since joining the IMF, Papua New Guinea has had a 0.6% growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP). As of 2022, Papua New Guinea has had 5 loan arrangements, 259.01 million in Special Drawing Rights (SDR), a quota of 263.2 million, and a total number of 4,091 votes.
Serbia has been a member of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) since December 14, 2022 with a quota of Special Drawing Rights (SDR) 654.8 million and 8,0007 votes. Serbia is currently represented on the Executive Board by Piotr Trabinski in a constituency with Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Poland, Serbia, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan that holds 2.88% of the total vote share.