Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman meets G20 expert group on strengthening of Multilateral Development Banks

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday met the G20 Independent Expert Group on strengthening of Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs).

The G20 Independent Expert Group (IEG) is co-convened by former American treasury secretary Lawrence Summers and ex-chairman of the 15th Finance Commission N K Singh.

The IEG set up by G20 India Presidency has focused on strengthening MDBs and delivered Volume 1 of its report which was acknowledged by G20 leaders in New Delhi Leaders Declaration earlier this month.

"The #G20IEG members are currently in India working on Volume 2 of their report to be discussed in #G20 meetings scheduled to be held under the Indian Presidency in #Marrakech on sidelines of @IMFNews @WorldBank #AnnualMeetings," the finance ministry said in a post on X.

The fourth and final Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBG) Meeting under India's G20 Presidency is taking place next month in Morocco.

MDBs need to provide an additional $260 billion annually to fund sustainable infrastructure and help nations achieve SDG targets, the group said in its Vol 1 report.

Additional spending of some $3 trillion per year is needed by 2030, of which $1.8 trillion represents additional investments in climate action, mostly in sustainable infrastructure, and $1.2 trillion in additional spending to attain other sustainable development goals (SDGs), it said.

The major MDBs are World Bank, International Finance Corporation (IFC), Asian Development Bank, Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and African Development Bank (AfDB).