2ª Reunión de ministros de finanzas y gobernadores de bancos centrales del G20 – Sesión 1: estado de la economía mundial

Este discurso fue pronunciado en inglés y no ha sido traducido.

Thank you, Chair.

I want to make three points.

My first point: Last year, trade expanded at a rate of 3.7%, outpacing global economic growth for the first time in years – an achievement driven primarily by a 9% surge in services exports. For a moment, the thought that the world was “deglobalizing” seemed unsubstantiated by the facts.

This promising momentum is now over, as reflected in the revised forecasts downward – around half a percentage point lower than previous estimates.

My second point is that more uncertain trade becomes, the more certain we can be of its costs. Unpredictable policy means predictable loss. Investment freezes, growth slows down, supply chains reshape before goods even move.

We are very worried with what is already happening in frontier economies, where despite continued monetary easing in some large economies, yield spreads continue to climb. In Latin America and Asia, they are at 2023 levels. In sub-Saharan Africa, they are at 2022 levels. This threatens a second debt repayment crunch in an already fragile scenario with low growth and higher for longer interest rates.

My third point is about the imperative to stabilize global trade.

We are at a crossroads. One path leads to dialogue, cooperation and shared prosperity; the other to a domino effect of retaliatory measures that no one knows where it could lead. Today, we have the agency to choose. Once the dominoes start falling, we might not.

But no matter what happens, some countries currently don’t have any agency at all. Our research shows that 54 countries subject to higher than 10% tariffs account each for less than 0.1% of the US trade deficit; 28 of them are small and least developed countries that do not contribute to global trade imbalances. They are on the frontline of trade disruption but at the back of the queue of trade negotiations. There is merit in having a new look at these facts and sparing these countries from a negative impact.

Excellencies,

This moment demands moral courage from the G20. We must be the steady hand that calms markets, that calls for reform within the WTO framework, so we architect a trading system that serves all nations, big and small.

I thank you.