G20 ministers pledge "strong action" to shore up world economy

Sep 23, 2011, 8:35 GMT

Washington - The finance ministers and central bank chiefs of the Group of 20 (G20) leading industrialized and emerging nations in a statement overnight Thursday pledged a 'strong and coordinated' response to shore up the flagging world economy.

'We are taking strong actions to maintain financial stability, restore confidence and support growth,' they said in a joint statement after a meeting in Washington.

That included committing to 'preserve the stability of banking systems and financial markets as required' by, among other things, ensuring 'that banks are adequately capitalized and have sufficient access to funding to deal with current risks.'

They also vowed to implement new so-called Basel III international standards on bank capitalization and liquidity within the agreed timeframe. The new rules on capital requirements, leverage and liquidity are to be implemented in stages, between now and 2019.

Weak growth, high unemployment, sovereign debt stresses and market turbulence presented 'heightened downside risks,' the finance bosses acknowledged, while assuring they were not resting on their laurels.

In Europe, eurozone members had taken 'major actions' to improve their public finances and were in the process of ratifying new rules on an expanded use of the European Financial Stability Fund to try to contain the bloc's debt crisis.

The United States government, meanwhile, had put forward a 'significant package' to boost growth and employment, while developing economies were adopting policies to maintain stability and sustain growth.

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