Zoom
Nov 16, 2023
9:00 AM - 10:00 AM (GMT-5)
Host:
Center for Economic and Policy Research and LATINDADD
CEPR and LATINDADD recently co-published a new report, more SDRs for Latin America and the Caribbean: an opportunity in times of multiple crises, (Spanish version here, English version forthcoming) in which co-authors Andrés Arauz and Francisco Amsler look at the impact and uses of the International Monetary Funds 2021 issuance of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) and argue that more such allocations are needed to support regional efforts to address climate change and advance the sustainable development goals.
On November 16, we launched the report with a webinar that was moderated by LATINDADD's Patricia Miranda, and that featured:
Andrés Arauz, coauthor of the report, former director of Ecuador's central bank, and a cepr senior research fellow. Arauz explains how SDRs work and how while their distribution may be regressive, their use by developing countries, in the region and globally, is progressive. He discusses how SDRs provided critical financial support to countries during the pandemic, and how more SDR issuances are needed to help developing countries address the climate crisis and achieve development goals. You can watch his presentation here (starting at 4:32) and his slides (in Spanish) are available here.
María Fernanda Valdez, deputy minister of finance in Colombia, reacted to the main points of the report and then provided an overview of Colombia President Gustavo Petros proposal for a Marshall plan to help finance developing countries efforts to adapt to and mitigate the global climate crisis. As she explains, a new issuance of SDRs is a central plank of this proposal. You can see her presentation here (starting at 23:27).
Shari Spiegel, UN/DESA director of financing for sustainable development, discussed how un secretary-general António Guterres has emphasized the importance of SDRs to support developing countries. She noted that Guterres supports long-term reforms of the sdr distribution system with, for instance, automated SDR allocations that would be triggered by countries needs. You can watch her presentation here (starting at 37:13).
You can view the entire video here.
