MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

G20 to address commodity prices “volatility” in special meeting in Argentina

Argentina’s Economy Minister Amado Boudou

G-20 Economy ministers will be meeting May 18/19 in Argentina to address commodity prices’ variations, according to Argentine sources. The meeting was agreed during the recent IMF/World Bank spring assemblies in Washington, following on Argentina’s deep concern about the “volatility” of commodity prices.

In an official release, the Argentine government calls for “innovative tools” to mitigate the volatility derived from the ‘productive cycles’ of commodities. The release also warns that the world is showing a sustained consumption demand from emerging economies, “which means that what are needed are policies oriented to increase supply”.

The G20 of industrialized and emerging economies is made up of the European Union, G8 (US, UK, France, Germany, Japan, Canada, Italy and Russia), South Korea, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, China, India, Indonesia, Australia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and Turkey.

The meeting will be chaired by the French Economy minister since Paris currently holds the G20 rotating presidency.

Argentina’s Economy minister Amado Boudou said that “world cooperation and coordination is needed to support policies geared to increase commodities supply”.

“This does not mean only focusing technical and financial aid to vulnerable countries but also creating the market conditions to make possible the full development of agriculture in farming countries”, according to the Argentine position before the IMF and WB.

Boudou revealed that to further support the Argentine position a G4 space was agreed made up of Brazil, Australia, South Africa and Argentina, all important producers and exporters of agriculture commodities.

WB President Robert Zoellick when addressing the recent spring assembly in Washington said at his opening speech that the world was climbing out of a crisis, but other risks were emerging most of them because of the “high and volatile” prices of commodities and called on the G20 to address the issue.