Deputy PM at IMF, WB meetings

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance Uhuru Kenyatta is leading the Kenyan delegation to this year's International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group meetings in Washington DC, U.S.A.

The annual meetings bring together around 10,000 CEOs of Central Banks, ministers of finance and development, private sector executives, and academics to discuss issues of global concern, including the world economic outlook, poverty eradication, economic development, and aid effectiveness.

In an interview on the sidelines of the meetings Kenyatta said improving the social sectors of the economy was the only solution to solving the global financial crisis.

On the challenges facing the developing countries especially in Africa, Kenyatta said there is need for a shift in focus from over reliance on aid to increased investments and job creation programmes.

"This will ensure steady return to the kind of pre-crisis levels of growth," he said.

Citing the Economic Stimulus Programme, Kenyatta said though Kenya is not yet out of the woods yet, it was heading in the right direction.

The programme focuses on health, education and creation of necessary skills the people require to increase the growth levels.

During the plenary session IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn outlined four key challenges for the global economy, urging advanced countries and emerging markets to revive their cooperation to avoid competitive currency adjustments and imbalance to the still fragile global economy.

Among the challenges are public debt which some countries are unable to manage, a recovery of 30 million jobs lost during the crisis, a downward trend of the financial sector and vanishing of the commitment to cooperation.

"The recovery clearly is going on but, as everybody knows, it's still very fragile. And it's fragile partly because it's uneven," Strauss-Kahn said.

"When you look at Asia, when you look at South America, you see very high rates of growth and obviously for these parts of the world the crisis is over.

"Just reviving growth is not enough. Growth without jobs doesn't mean much for the man in the street," he added.

According to Strauss-Kahn Africa is also seeing a return to something like 5 percent growth. But recovery in Europe is sluggish and the outlook in the United States uncertain.

"We probably need more information on the third and fourth quarter of this year to know where it is going," he said adding that a double-dip recession, forecast by some analysts was unlikely.

Networked economy

The President of the World Bank Group Mr. Robert Zoellick commended the rebounding of the foreign direct investments and bonds in emerging markets but regretted that the weak bank lending which was particularly hard on low income countries and small companies that rely on it.

Zoellick emphasized on the need to work toward building a new, networked economy and an architecture that suits it so as to come out of crises both wiser and stronger.

"We need a more flexible and different approach to development. You are the G187. This is a potentially powerful concept. It is rich and poor. It is North, South, East and West. So we welcome this opportunity to work with you and to build a modernized multilateralism," he concluded.

Apart from the broader umbrella of the formal sessions, there will be a host of meetings of different official groups, including the G-20 advanced economies and emerging markets, the Commonwealth Finance Ministers, and the G7.

There are also meetings with civil society, academics, and the private sector.

The Kenyan delegation also includes minister for roads, Franklin Bett, treasury PS, Joseph Kinyua, roads PS Eng. Michael Kamau, Finance Economic Secretary Dr. Geoffrey Mwau and the Finance External Relations Director, Joseph Kinyanjui among other officials.