Members of Central Banks Governors’ Club of Central Asia, Black Sea Region and Balkan Countries discuss global economy recovery prospects
The post-crisis recovery of the global economy is uneven. Moreover, countries are facing unprecedented macroeconomic policy challenges induced by the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic.
These were the topics discussed at the online meeting of the Central Banks Governors’ Club of Central Asia, Black Sea Region and Balkan Countries (the Club includes the representatives of 26 central banks). The discussion was moderated by Bank of Russia Governor Elvira Nabiullina.
As noted by the participants in the first session of the meeting, the key challenges for central banks in addressing the consequences of the pandemic might be the spread of new coronavirus strains, higher inflation fuelled by demand considerably exceeding supply and shifts in the structure of demand, as well as monetary policy normalisation by advanced economies.
The second session moderated by First Deputy Governor of the Bank of Russia Ksenia Yudaeva focused on the climate agenda. Although carbon emissions decreased temporarily during the pandemic amid the decline in economic activity, climate change is a systemic challenge affecting people’s welfare and the stability and development of the financial sector. Increasingly more governments are announcing the commitment to achieve carbon neutrality and are implementing related policies. In this context, financial regulators are actively discussing their role in addressing climate change consequences. The need for financial regulators to take part in the climate agenda is still debatable. Nonetheless, the participants in the session believe that if central banks take into account and monitor climate risks, this will help mitigate their adverse consequences in the future.
The central bank governors discussed the main issues of the meeting with representatives of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the Network of Central Banks and Supervisors for Greening the Financial System (NGFS). The opinion of the academic community was presented in the course of the discussions by Patricia Mosser, programme director at Columbia University.
The meeting of the Club was attended by the governors of the central banks of Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, China, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Israel, the Kyrgyz Republic, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, and Turkey. The Club also includes the governors of the central banks of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Poland, Tajikistan, and Ukraine.