Europe stays out of bid for top position at IMF's main policy-setting committee

1 July 2008

For the first time, the Europeans have decided to stay out of the bidding for the chair of the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC).

According to an article in Reuters, European governments, for the first time, have decided to not seek the chairmanship of the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) main policy-setting committee.

Instead, finance ministers from Egypt, India, and Canada were named as candidates for the IMF's 24-member International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC). Except for a brief period in the 1980s, a European finance minister has traditionally chaired the IMFC, and the Managing Director of the institution has also been a European.

Last year, the tradition of a developed country at the helm of the IMFC was challenged for the first time by India, which proposed its finance minister, Palaniappan Chidambaram, as a candidate.

Source

Europe stays out of IMF policy job contest, by Leslie Wroughton, June 25, 2008. (Reuters website)