{"id":204214,"date":"2010-01-20T10:00:44","date_gmt":"2010-01-20T15:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.wsj.com\/economics\/2010\/01\/20\/new-imf-same-old-problems\/"},"modified":"2010-01-20T10:00:44","modified_gmt":"2010-01-20T15:00:44","slug":"new-imf-same-old-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/204214","title":{"rendered":"New IMF, Same Old Problems"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the past couple of years, the International Monetary Fund<\/strong> has been thumping its chest that it has changed and is ready to take the lead on global economic issues.<\/p>\n

A report by the IMF\u0092s independent evaluation office, which is charged with critiquing the institution, suggests the IMF still has a long way to go. Only a minority of officials in the richest, most powerful countries, found the IMF\u0092s analyses \u0093compelling,\u0094 the evaluation group found.<\/p>\n

IMF staffers working on rich countries were also frustrated. When analyses were critical, the rich countries \u0093discouraged\u0094 IMF staffers from talking to the press, according to the evaluation group. \u0093A desire (reinforced by [IMF] management) to avoid displeasing the authorities, was a fact of life for staff working on the advanced countries, and a challenge to the independence of their analysis,\u0094 the reports said.<\/p>\n

Government officials of some the world\u0092s poorest countries had a higher opinion of the IMF\u0092s work, meanwhile, with at least 70% of the officials surveyed rated their interactions with the IMF as \u0093effective or very effective,\u0094 the report said.<\/p>\n

But in the poorest countries, the legacy of heavy-handed IMF loan programs, when the IMF pushed borrowers to privatize and slash spending, continued to tar the Fund\u0092s reputation. Government officials in some of those countries complained that the IMF continued to be inflexible and had \u0093bitter complaints about Fund interactions, many of which related to major program interruptions\u0094 or delays in debt relief, the evaluation group said.<\/p>\n

The report was based on surveys sent to government officials and social- action groups in 30 wealthy countries, including the U.S., Germany, Japan, Britain, and 77 poor nations, including Bolivia, Nigeria and Vietnam. IMF staffers working on these countries were also sampled<\/p>\n

The surveys, along with some interviewing, largely took place between November 2008 and April 2009, the evaluation group said, and covered IMF programs and advice made between 2001 and 2008, with \u0093special attention\u0094 on 2007 and 2008<\/p>\n

Since the interviews were completed the IMF was assigned to analyze whether the economic policies of the Group of 20 wealthy and large developing nations would produce sustainable global growth. Given the IMF\u0092s weakness in handling big wealthy countries, that could be a problem. John Hicklin, a spokesman for the evaluation group, said that the lesson for the IMF is that it must \u0093rise to the occasion\u0094 and \u0093upgrade the international dimension of its work.\u0094<\/p>\n

In a statement, IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn<\/strong> said that \u0093promoting candor in [IMF] staff\u0092s assessments is critical.\u0094<\/p>\n

With the poor countries, the IMF is making headway, the reports found. Officials from two countries said the IMF had been aided them in renegotiating debt, while a third said the IMF had been \u0093extremely helpful\u0094 in getting nations to resume aid, the evaluation group reported.<\/p>\n

About half of the officials surveyed in the poor nations said the IMF\u0092s willingness to consider different approaches had improved over the past two years. Most of the specific complaints, said the evaluation group, involved IMF loan programs or policies between 2002 and 2004.<\/p>\n

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For the past couple of years, the International Monetary Fund has been thumping its chest that it has changed and is ready to take the lead on global economic issues. A report by the IMF\u0092s independent evaluation office, which is charged with critiquing the institution, suggests the IMF still has a long way to go. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":850,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-204214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/850"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=204214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}