By Todd Buell
WASHINGTON (MNI) – Cooperation and coordination are the keywords
for resolving international currency conflicts, the head of the Central
Bank of Jordan Umayya Toukan told Market News International Sunday.
The biggest challenge to global growth at present is keeping the
fledgling recovery sustainable, the Jordanian central banker said on the
margins of the IMF/World Bank meetings here.
As the effects of fiscal and monetary stimulus wane, recovery will
now have to be underpinned by consumer demand, the central banker said.
Advanced countries will now have to turn to the developing world to help
them boost export growth, he commented.
Consumer demand “is there,” at present in emerging countries, and
“of course this is also good for advanced economies, because they can
increase their exports to emerging markets and probably this is the
answer to the deficiency of consumer demand in advanced countries,” he
assessed.
“Maybe advanced countries should concentrate on the export sector
now,” he assessed.
A problem with this paradigm is that some countries that import
from the advanced world do not have freely floating currencies, he said.
Asked how this problem could be best solved, the central banker
answered, “I think of course the key word is cooperation or
coordination — cooperation by everyone, because it is in the interest
of the global economy to do something.”
“Because the domestic pressures, domestic politics sometimes
dictate certain measures which may not be totally in line with the
interests of the global community, we need to have a long-term vision
and need to coordinate and cooperate on these issues,” he said.
Given the modest growth outlook over the next couple of years in
advanced economies, oil prices should “not be alarming,” the governor
predicted.
— +49-1736947935, tbuell@marketnews.com
** Market News International Washington Bureau: 202-371-2121 **
[TOPICS: M$Q$$$,M$A$$$,MAQDS$,M$$FX$,MX$$$$,MI$$$$,MGX$$$]
