G7 meet aims to revive global growth
The world's top financial leaders meet yesterday in France to work on a plan to solve the European debt crisis that is rattling markets and to avoid another recession by boosting growth.
The finance ministers and central bankers from the G7 major industrialised economies will also focus on the health of European banking system, which in August was shaken by sudden sell-offs sparked by investor anxiety.
International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde will also join the ministers from Canada, the United States, Japan, Germany, Britain, France and Italy at the meeting in the Mediterranean port city of Marseille.
France -- the host and this year's head of the G7 and the wider G20 -- said this week it wanted the two-day meeting to reach a "coordinated response" that would boost growth, create employment and help pay off debt.
Financial regulation will also be tackled in a debate hosted by future European Central Bank head Mario Draghi.
Libya's new administration -- whose fighters have just ousted longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi -- has also been invited in a follow-up to the economic support for the so-called Arab Spring announced at a G7 meeting in May.
The Marseille meeting opens a day after President Barack Obama was to make a crucial speech aimed at tackling zero US job growth and jolting the economy back into life and away from a double-dip recession.
The plan includes injecting $300 billion in tax cuts, infrastructure spending and aid to state and local governments, US media reported.
The US jobs engine has shuddered to a halt, growth is stagnant, deficits and debt cloud Washington's credit outlook, stock markets are tumbling, consumer confidence has dried up and global contagion is feared again.
The meeting comes at a time of high political tension in Europe's major economies over the debt crisis, with governments struggling to get deep reform and austerity measures through parliament.
Comments