FM Nirmala Sitharaman participates in 103rd Meeting of World Bank Development Committee Plenary

Union Minister for Finance Nirmala Sitharaman participated in the 103rd Meeting of the Development Committee Plenary of World Bank through video conferencing. The items on the agenda included World Bank Group (WBG) and International Monetary Fund Support for Debt Relief Under the Common Framework and Beyond COVID-19 pandemic.

Ministry of Finance in a tweet said, "Finance Minister Smt. @nsitharaman attends the Development Committee Meeting of the @WorldBank - @IMFNews via virtual mode in New Delhi."

In her intervention at this session, the Finance Minister stated that we are all engaged in steering our economies and people safely out of the COVID-19 pandemic. She said, the Government of India has taken several measures to contain the spread of the pandemic and also to mitigate its social and economic impact including a series of economic stimulus packages in the last one year. Ms Sitharaman shared that the Government has announced Aatma Nirbhar Packages amounting to more than 13 per cent of the GDP.

These packages were meant not only to provide social protection to the poor and vulnerable but also to push forward economic reforms. The Finance Minister noted that the WBG has stepped up its financing in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic with total financing approvals exceeding 100 billion dollars for the first time.

She appreciated the pro-active role played by the WBG in helping developing countries access vaccines in a timely and affordable manner in coordination with other multilateral agencies like WHO and GAVI. She also urged the World Bank to explore the possibility to sustain crisis response keeping in mind the debt sustainability of vulnerable countries and the financial sustainability of the WBG.