OREANDA-NEWS. Eesti Pank and the Ministry of Finance will attend the spring meetings of the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC) of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Development Committee of the World Bank on 15–17 April in Washington. The main subjects of the meetings will be the outlook and risks for the global economy and the strategic goals of the IMF and the World Bank for the next half year.

The IMF meeting will focus on developments in the global economy and the outlook for financial markets. It will also discuss ways of encouraging global economic growth and will consider the risks to growth. Questions related to the resources of the IMF, in particular measures to ensure the sufficiency of IMF resources if member states want to borrow from the Fund, will be addressed as well.

The meeting of the World Bank will discuss how to make the contribution of the Bank to financing development work and providing technical assistance more efficient and how to strengthen the financial power of the Bank. It is important in this to safeguard the flexibility of the Bank in global development and in reacting to emerging crises. During the meetings there will be more detailed discussion of Global Connect, initiated by the USA, which aims to bring the internet to 1.5 billion people in the developing world by 2020. Estonia will make a presentation on the success of the introduction of e-state services and will talk about sharing its experience with developing countries.

Estonia will be represented in the spring meetings by Deputy Governor of Eesti Pank Madis Mueller and by Head of the EU and International Relations Department at the Ministry of Finance Andres Kuningas. Experts from the central bank will also participate.

The representatives of Eesti Pank and the Ministry of Finance will meet IMF specialists during the meetings to discuss budget topics, the development of the euro area economy, and the plan for the IMF mission to Estonia. Meetings are also planned with the heads of mission for Russia and China and with staff from the World Bank.

The meetings of the IMF and the World Bank are held twice a year and bring together high-level delegations from all the countries of the world to discuss key economic questions and coordinate global economic policy.