The IMF and Civil Society
Conversations with Civil Society
December 14, 2007
The Fund undertook a series of meetings with a variety of civil society organizations during the second half of 2007
December 14: Staff from the IMF's Research Department met with an Oxfam America representative to talk about the Fund's take on biofuels and its impact on food prices.
December 12: A representative of the Sierra Leone Labour Congress met with the Sierra Leone team to establish contact for future dialogue.
December 11-13: Staff from the African (AFR), Fiscal Affairs (FAD), and Policy Development and Review (PDR) Departments met with representatives from Global Witness' conflict resources team to talk about transparency in Cote d'Ivoire's cocoa sector and the Fund's work on fiscal transparency.
December 10-11: EXR and PDR staff and World Bank staff met with representatives of the International Trade Union Confederation/Global Unions in Washington, D.C., for an interim meeting to review progress on commitments made at the 2006 high-level meeting and a technical meeting to review the enhanced dialogue set up in 2002. It was decided to hold future technical meetings on the topics of pension reforms, gender issues, and the financialization of the global economy. The Fund agreed to conduct a follow-up briefing for the unions on global market developments early in 2008.
November 29: Staff from EXR and the Western Hemisphere Department (WHD) participated in a meeting with the World Conference of Religions for Peace (WCRP) Executive Committee of the Council of Religious Leaders of Latin America and the Caribbean. The delegation met with the Fund to talk about development issues such as achieving the Millennium Development Goals, social justice, inequality, income distribution, the Poverty Reduction Strategy process, and debt relief. The delegation was headed by Cardinal Julio Terrazas from Bolivia.
November 10: AFR advisor John Wakeman-Linn participated in the Wharton Africa Business Forum, organized by the Wharton Business School of the University of Pennsylvania. The session on the role of the Bretton Woods Institutions in Africa was attended by about 50-60 people. Audience questions primarily focused on the present engagement of the Fund with African countries and how it differs from the past. Other speakers included Sudhir Shetty, Sector Director at the World Bank and Desire Vencatachellum, Principal Research Economist at the African Development Bank.
November 6-7: Sanjeev Gupta (FAD), Patricia Alonso-Gamo (PDR) and Jennifer Bisping (EXR) organized two events in Europe on the Fund’s recent papers on scaling-up of aid and on the Fund's role in low-income countries: A meeting with French and Belgian CSOs at the IMF office in Paris, and a panel discussion at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) in London with discussants Mick Foster (formerly ODI, now a consultant) and Max Lawson of Oxfam Great Britain. Participants stressed the need for coordination with donors and dialogue with civil society, specifically, more consultations in the early stages of policy formulation both at the global and country levels. They also criticized the G8 governments for not delivering on their Gleneagles promises. Gupta and Alonso-Gamo subsequently met with officials of the European Union in Brussels.
October 31-November 2: Jennifer Bisping (EXR) conducted a seminar for South Eastern European CSOs at the IMF’s Joint Vienna Institute. Twenty-three CSOs, including nongovernmental organizations, trade unions and think tanks from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Serbia, and Montenegro participated. IMF staff from the European Department, FAD, as well as the Executive Director for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, and Montenegro participated.
September 7: AFR Director Abdoulaye Bio Tchané participated in a Center for Global Development (CGD) panel discussion titled: "Does the IMF Constrain Health Spending in Poor Countries?" CGD visiting fellow David Goldsbrough presented a recent CGD report on the topic. Other discussants were Ambassador Amina Salum Ali, Permanent Representative to the African Union's Mission to the United States, and Jose A. Sulemane, Advisor to the IMF Executive Director Peter Gakunu.
August: Two meetings to discuss the Fund’s work on Poverty and Social Impact Analysis (PSIA) took place between staff from New Rules for Global Finance, Oxfam International and staff from the Fiscal Affairs (FAD), Policy Development and Review (PDR), African (AFR) and External Relations (EXR) Departments.