As IMF turns 80, mounting global challenges mean world must work together | The Business Standard
Skip to main content
  • Latest
  • Epaper
  • Economy
    • Banking
    • Stocks
    • Industry
    • Analysis
    • Bazaar
    • RMG
    • Corporates
    • Aviation
  • Videos
    • TBS Today
    • TBS Stories
    • TBS World
    • News of the day
    • TBS Programs
    • Podcast
    • Editor's Pick
  • World+Biz
  • Features
    • Panorama
    • The Big Picture
    • Pursuit
    • Habitat
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Mode
    • Tech
    • Explorer
    • Brands
    • In Focus
    • Book Review
    • Earth
    • Food
    • Luxury
    • Wheels
  • More
    • Sports
    • TBS Graduates
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • Gallery
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Magazine
    • Climate Change
    • Health
    • Cartoons
  • বাংলা
The Business Standard

Wednesday
June 18, 2025

Sign In
Subscribe
  • Latest
  • Epaper
  • Economy
    • Banking
    • Stocks
    • Industry
    • Analysis
    • Bazaar
    • RMG
    • Corporates
    • Aviation
  • Videos
    • TBS Today
    • TBS Stories
    • TBS World
    • News of the day
    • TBS Programs
    • Podcast
    • Editor's Pick
  • World+Biz
  • Features
    • Panorama
    • The Big Picture
    • Pursuit
    • Habitat
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Mode
    • Tech
    • Explorer
    • Brands
    • In Focus
    • Book Review
    • Earth
    • Food
    • Luxury
    • Wheels
  • More
    • Sports
    • TBS Graduates
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • Gallery
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Magazine
    • Climate Change
    • Health
    • Cartoons
  • বাংলা
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 18, 2025
As IMF turns 80, mounting global challenges mean world must work together

Global Economy

Gita Bhatt; IMF Blog
04 June, 2024, 08:40 pm
Last modified: 04 June, 2024, 08:56 pm

Related News

  • Ending the stalemate and thereafter: The IMF loans in Bangladesh
  • Flexible exchange rate crucial for investment, competitiveness: Fahmida Khatun
  • Bangladesh secures staff-level agreement with IMF for $1.3b disbursement amid reform commitments
  • From Bretton Woods to Beggar-Thy-Neighbour: The unraveling of US-led economic systems
  • BB moves for managed floating exchange rate to get IMF loan

As IMF turns 80, mounting global challenges mean world must work together

Our biggest challenges—from global warming to demographic and technological transformations—cannot be resolved by countries acting alone.

Gita Bhatt; IMF Blog
04 June, 2024, 08:40 pm
Last modified: 04 June, 2024, 08:56 pm
Representational image. Photo: Daniel Liévano via IMF Blog
Representational image. Photo: Daniel Liévano via IMF Blog

"Prosperity, like peace, is indivisible," US Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau Jr. said as he opened the Bretton Woods conference in 1944. It was, as he put it, an "elementary economic axiom" to help guide the founders of the IMF.

Today, these words are more important than ever. Our biggest challenges—from global warming to demographic and technological transformations—cannot be resolved by countries acting alone.

Yet just when we need greater international cooperation, we get the opposite: more fragmentation, conflict, and global disengagement; more zero-sum thinking that risks leaving our world poorer and less secure.

The Business Standard Google News Keep updated, follow The Business Standard's Google news channel

As we mark the IMF's 80th anniversary, we ask: How can the Fund continue to adapt to the new realities and the changing needs of our 190 members? This F&D issue seeks to provide answers that are inspiring and thought-provoking.

IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva strikes an optimistic note and calls for "21st century multilateralism"—a framework for international cooperation that's more open and representative, with a better balance between advanced economies and the voices of emerging market and developing economies.

These voices are represented in this issue by top policymakers such as Barbados' Prime Minister Mia Mottley, Kenyan President William Ruto, and Pablo García-Silva, a former vice-governor of Chile's central bank. The economic fortunes of their regions depend, in many ways, on a better multilateral system, and they suggest ways in which the IMF can deliver that for its members.

On that point, proposals abound. Adam Posen reckons that narrowing the IMF's mandate to its core macroeconomic mission and giving it greater operational independence would make it more evenhanded. Raghuram Rajan makes a related point: delegating more authority to the IMF's management—coupled with reform to more fairly allocate quotas, the financial contributions paid by each member—could help bring a fragmented world together on critical issues.

Among these is climate change. That brings us to Masood Ahmed's piece, which considers the ongoing debate over the IMF's proper role in addressing the climate threat.

The Fund, of course, has long adapted to change. The IMF's Ceyla Pazarbasioglu shows how much the organization has evolved in its regular reviews of member economies and its regional and global analyses. In a similar vein, Atish Rex Ghosh and Andrew Stanley chart how IMF lending, in particular, has evolved rapidly over the past 30 years. And historian Harold James draws lessons from the past for global financial risk management.

As we move forward, one thing remains clear. "We cannot have a better world without international cooperation," notes Georgieva. Taking inspiration from John Maynard Keynes, one of the IMF's founding fathers, she concludes: "Keynes would encourage us to go even further as a global 'transmission line' for sound economic policies, financial resources, knowledge—and as the ultimate platform for global economic cooperation."

We also mark the 60th anniversary of this quarterly magazine, Finance & Development. Just as the Bretton Woods institutions and the global economy have adapted, so too has F&D. Today we are a platform on which thought leaders in many fields and from many countries explain and debate issues central to the global economy.

I want to express my gratitude to all our readers and contributors as we look forward to another 60 years of fresh thinking and inspiring debate.


Gita Bhatt is the Head of Policy Communications and Editor-In-Chief of Finance & Development Magazine.

World+Biz

IMF / IMF Blog

Comments

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderation decisions are subjective. Published comments are readers’ own views and The Business Standard does not endorse any of the readers’ comments.

Top Stories

  • Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks during a meeting with the members of the Expediency Discernment Council in Tehran, Iran October 12, 2022. File Photo: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
    Khamenei threatens 'irreparable damage' if US joins Israeli strikes, rejects Trump call for surrender
  • BNP Standing Committee member Salahuddin Ahmed. Sketch: TBS
    BNP does not agree to NCC formation due to lack of accountability: Salahuddin
  • Israel strikes Iran's capital Tehran on Sunday night. File Photo: Collected
    Bangladeshi diplomat's house in Tehran damaged in Israel strike: BBC Bangla

MOST VIEWED

  • Infograph: TBS
    Govt to ease loan rules to help foreign firms expand in Bangladesh
  • A view of Iranian missiles across the sky as seen by Biman pilot Enam Talukder. Photo: Enam Talukder
    Biman pilot witnessed Iran's missiles flying towards Israel
  • Global map showing nuclear weapon inventories by country as of January 2025, including deployed, stored, and retired warheads. Source: SIPRI
    How Israel's secret nuclear arsenal comes under spotlight amid attacks on Iran
  • Infograph:TBS
    Overseas employment back in flow as Saudi recruitment picks up in May
  • Google Pay. Photo: Collected
    Google Pay coming to Bangladesh next week
  • European Council President Antonio Costa, Japan's Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, French President Emmanuel Macron, Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney, US President Donald Trump, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen pose for a family photo during the G7 Summit, in Kananaskis, Alberta, Canada, June 16, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett/Pool
    G7 expresses support for Israel, calls Iran source of instability

Related News

  • Ending the stalemate and thereafter: The IMF loans in Bangladesh
  • Flexible exchange rate crucial for investment, competitiveness: Fahmida Khatun
  • Bangladesh secures staff-level agreement with IMF for $1.3b disbursement amid reform commitments
  • From Bretton Woods to Beggar-Thy-Neighbour: The unraveling of US-led economic systems
  • BB moves for managed floating exchange rate to get IMF loan

Features

The Kallyanpur Canal is burdened with more than 600,000 kilograms of waste every month. Photo: Courtesy

Kallyanpur canal project shows how to combat plastic pollution in Dhaka

23h | Panorama
The GLS600 overall has a curvaceous nature, with seamless blends across every panel. PHOTO: Arfin Kazi

Mercedes Maybach GLS600: Definitive Luxury

2d | Wheels
Renowned authors Imdadul Haque Milon, Mohit Kamal, and poet–children’s writer Rashed Rouf seen at Current Book Centre, alongside the store's proprietor, Shahin. Photo: Collected

From ‘Screen and Culture’ to ‘Current Book House’: Chattogram’s oldest surviving bookstore

3d | Panorama
Photos: Collected

Kurtis that make a great office wear

5d | Mode

More Videos from TBS

AI will replace jobs at tech giant: Amazon CEO

AI will replace jobs at tech giant: Amazon CEO

47m | Others
End of a loophole: Defaulters on foreign loans barred from local bank borrowing

End of a loophole: Defaulters on foreign loans barred from local bank borrowing

1h | TBS Insight
Is Putin a Mediator or an Opportunist?

Is Putin a Mediator or an Opportunist?

2h | Others
Trump brand expands again; this time into mobile phones

Trump brand expands again; this time into mobile phones

3h | Others
EMAIL US
contact@tbsnews.net
FOLLOW US
WHATSAPP
+880 1847416158
The Business Standard
  • About Us
  • Contact us
  • Sitemap
  • Advertisement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Comment Policy
Copyright © 2025
The Business Standard All rights reserved
Technical Partner: RSI Lab

Contact Us

The Business Standard

Main Office -4/A, Eskaton Garden, Dhaka- 1000

Phone: +8801847 416158 - 59

Send Opinion articles to - oped.tbs@gmail.com

For advertisement- sales@tbsnews.net