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As the attempt of a Chinese state-owned oil company to merge with US-based Unocal Corporation fanned protectionist passion in the US Congress, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan warned senators in public testimony not to let their misguided frustrations with China’s economic policies breed reactions that would do the US economy more harm than good. What is not generally recognized is the fact that Chinese monetary and trade policies are defensively driven by US policy. Proposed tariffs against Chinese goods and other forms of protectionism would significantly lower US living standards and would not save jobs in the US, Greenspan told members of the Senate Finance Committee.

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Washington Consensus is a “conditionality” for inclusion into global market fundamentalism through supranational intervention on national sovereignty prerogative over monetary and fiscal policies.  It is another tool for building a new form of empire.

IMF

The mandate of the IMF is to promote international monetary cooperation and provides policy advice and technical assistance to help countries build and maintain strong economies through a sound monetary regime. It also makes loans and helps countries design policy programs to solve balance of payments problems when sufficient financing on affordable terms cannot be obtained in credit markets to meet net international payments. IMF loans are short and medium term and funded mainly by the pool of quota contributions that its members provide. IMF staff are primarily economists with wide experience in macroeconomic and financial policies.

World Bank

The mandate of the World Bank is to promote long-term economic development and poverty reduction by providing technical and financial support to help countries reform particular sectors or implement specific projects, such as building schools and health clinics, providing clean water and electricity, fighting disease, and protecting the environment. World Bank assistance is generally long term and is funded both by member country contributions and through development bond issuance in the credit market. World Bank staff are generally specialists in particular issues, sectors, or techniques in development. The staffs of the two institutions also cooperate on the conditionality involved in their respective lending programs.

The IMF and World Bank also work together to reduce the external debt burdens of the most heavily indebted poor countries under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative and the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI). The objective is to help low-income countries achieve their development goals without creating future debt problems. IMF and Bank staff jointly prepare country debt sustainability analyses under the Debt Sustainability Framework (DSF) developed by the two institutions.

In 1999, the IMF and the World Bank launched the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) approach as a key component in the process leading to debt relief under the HIPC Initiative and an important anchor in concessional lending by the Fund and the Bank.

While PRSPs continue to underpin the HIPC Initiative, the World Bank adopted in July 2014 a new approach to country engagement that no longer requires PRSPs while focusing on the elimination of extreme poverty and promotion of shared prosperity. The Fund continues to rely on the PRSP to provide the link between a Fund-supported program and the poverty reduction and growth objectives of a member country.

Monitoring progress on the MDGs 

Since 2004, the Fund and the Bank have worked together on the Global Monitoring Report (GMR), which assesses progress towards the 2015 UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

According to the final MDG report launched on July 6, 2015 by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the MDGs have produced the most successful anti-poverty movement in history and will serve as the jumping-off point for the new sustainable development agenda to be adopted this year. The Millennium Development Goals Report 2015 found that the 15-year effort to achieve the eight aspirational goals set out in the Millennium Declaration in 2000 was largely successful across the globe, while acknowledging shortfalls that remain. The data and analysis presented in the report show that with targeted interventions, sound strategies, adequate resources and political will, even the poorest can make progress.

“Following profound and consistent gains, we now know that extreme poverty can be eradicated within one more generation”, said Ban Ki-moon. “The MDGs have greatly contributed to this progress and have taught us how governments, business and civil society can work together to achieve transformational breakthroughs”.

Goals and targets work

The MDG report confirms that goal-setting can lift millions of people out of poverty, empower women and girls, improve health and well-being, and provide vast new opportunities for better lives. Only two short decades ago, nearly half of the developing world lived in extreme poverty. The number of people now living in extreme poverty has declined by more than half, falling from 1.9 billion in 1990 to 836 million in 2015. The world has also witnessed dramatic improvement in gender equality in schooling since the MDGs, and gender parity in primary school has been achieved in the majority of countries. More girls are now in school, and women have gained ground in parliamentary representation over the past 20 years in nearly 90 per cent of the 174 countries with data. The average proportion of women in parliament has nearly doubled during the same period. The rate of children dying before their fifth birthday has declined by more than half, dropping from 90 to 43 deaths per 1,000 live births since 1990. The maternal mortality ratio shows a decline of 45 per cent worldwide, with most of the reduction occurring since 2000.

Targeted investments in fighting diseases, such as HIV/AIDS and malaria, have brought unprecedented results. Over 6.2 million malaria deaths were averted between 2000 and 2015, while tuberculosis prevention, diagnosis and treatment interventions saved an estimated 37 million lives between 2000 and 2013. Worldwide, 2.1 billion have gained access to improved sanitation and the proportion of people practicing open defecation has fallen almost by half since 1990.

Official development assistance from developed countries saw an increase of 66 per cent in real terms from 2000 and 2014, reaching $135.2 billion.

Inequalities persist The report highlighted that signific