A coalition of faith-based organisations, Jubilee USA, has urged the World Bank and the international Monetary Fund (IMF) to stop the debt and food crises of low-income nations.
Eric LeCompte, Executive Secretary of the group, said this yesterday in Marrakech, on the sidelines of the ongoing World Bank/IMF Annual Meetings.
LeCompte said that it could be done by stopping the “ridiculous policies” of raising interest rates.
According to him, development banks can help address debt crises by ensuring that debt contracts have clauses where debt payments stop in the face of disasters and by promoting swaps, transparency and accountability.
“If wealthy countries donate Special Drawing Rights to development banks, we can put more resources where it is most needed
“As poor growth is forecasted for the global economy, it will be very difficult for developing countries to recover from the pandemic and food crises,” he said.
He, however, said that the World Bank listing of eight global challenges was helpful because they all dealt with aspects of poverty.
According to him, it is important that the World Bank tackles more global challenges, but we have no idea where the money is coming from to do that.
“We need to do a better job at responding to the climate, food, and inflation crises in the poorest countries.
“Unless we deal with high debt, we will not have the resources to address these crises.
“Some good news on getting new resources is that there is growing momentum to increase resources for development banks, “ he said.
World Bank and IMF are holding annual meetings in Marrakech, Morocco, Africa, for the first time in 50 years.