Only a few days after the announcement, in mid-February, of the resignation of the World Bank, David Malpass, the United States has created the surprise by appointing as a candidate for his succession Ajay Banga. This 63-year-old American naturalized Indian was the master’s boss, which he transformed into a global payment platform. He has no experience in development, even less in an international institution. The United States has rather chosen a specialist in the transformation of organizations. As explained by the American Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, in a statement of February 23, to congratulate himself on this designation, the new president “must change the World Bank to meet global challenges such as climate change”.
Development banks have an important role to play in low and medium -income countries, which attract only 20 % of investments on the planet in the renewable energies sector, while they total, Only 90 % of global needs. David Malpass, placed at the head of the World Bank by former American president Donald Trump, did not have the right profile. Several NGOs had accused him, in the fall of 2022, of being climatosceptic, when, asked about the role of fossil fuels in global warming, he had replied that he “was not a scientist”.
While the United Nations assess investment needs at $ 125,000 billion (117,000 billion euros) by 2050 to achieve carbon neutrality, the World Bank is called upon to redouble its efforts in the domain. Even if she already devotes a third of her funding to it, the rich countries would like this share to be more important and, above all, that it increases its financing capacities … without it costing them nothing. A report by a G20 working group, published in 2022, explains that multilateral development banks could increase their efforts up to $ 500 to 1,000 billion, in particular by increasing their fundraising on the markets. p>
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Problem: poor countries are not of the same opinion. First, they fear that the institution, by lending more without increasing its capital, will see its note degraded by the financial rating agencies, which would force them to borrow at higher rates. Then, they fear that these efforts are not being the detriment of development.
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