Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose country holds the rotating presidency of G20 this year and plays the host to the 2013 G20 Summit, told fellow summiteers that though situation had improved thanks to measures taken by G20 member states, it is still too early to become complacent and the group's main task is to bring back sustainable and balanced growth to the global economy.
"Unfortunately, this problem has not yet been resolved; systemic risks and conditions conducive to the recurrence of an acute crisis persist," said President Putin. "Just recently the IMF lowered its 2013 global growth forecast to 3.1 percent. Even though a year ago its estimates hovered around the 4-percent mark. The U.S. economy is growing, something that certainly makes us all very happy. Unfortunately, (the U.S.) growth is still not as fast as we would like."
As the rotating chair, Russia has prioritized quality jobs creation, transparency and trust and effective regulation as the pillars of the G20 development strategy.
The G20 leaders held their first working meeting Thursday, with one more scheduled for Friday before they should work out and announce a joint declaration.
At his summary briefing of the first day events at the St. Petersburg G20 Leaders' Summit, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told the press that summiteers at St. Petersburg had reached consensus to wind up short-money and to promote long-money instead.
Within G20, short money may mean supportive grants while long money means meaningful investment in development-oriented infrastructure.
"We all understand that policies that amount to giving away free money cannot continue indefinitely. So now our partners are beginning to remove non-standard financial and economic policy measures, and this may affect both the status of key global risks and the economies of other countries. As a matter of fact, we know that they are already affected," said Putin.
"We need to monitor constantly, predict possible consequences, and adopt additional preventive measures in a timely fashion at both national and global levels.
