Passi importanti stanno per essere approntati verso le aree periferiche
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onde ripristinare l'interscambio e lo sviluppo su scala globale
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Fonte Wall Street Journal :
The U.S. and the U.K. are putting together a global plan to provide several hundred billion dollars in trade financing to fight the sharpest contraction in global trade since the Great Depression.
Government officials in both countries said the initiative will be unveiled on April 2 at the London summit of the leaders of the world's biggest economic powers.
It's unclear how much detail will be worked out by then.
Under the proposal, the funds would come from the Group of 20 countries, which include industrialized nations and big developing countries.
These countries would spend about half of the money to increase funding of their own trade-finance agencies, which help to underwrite exports.
The other half would go to the World Bank, regional development banks and the International Monetary Fund to help finance exports from the world's poorer nations, which often ship to the U.S. and Europe.
"We have a framework that calls for everyone working together," a senior U.S. official said.
On Friday and Saturday, G-20 finance ministers and central bankers will meet to pave the way for the heads of government.
The global decline in trade shuts down a potential engine of growth as consumer spending and industrial production also fall.
The effects are felt around the world, but especially in developing nations in Asia and Latin America that depend on exports to the U.S., Europe and Japan for growth.
The initiative shows how President Barack Obama is trying to position himself on trade issues. While he campaigned as an opponent of many free-trade deals, he has governed differently, prodding Congress to modify "Buy America" provisions in the stimulus bill that gave preferences to domestic companies.
At the London summit, he and other leaders plan a united front against protectionism. Leaders want the World Trade Organization to monitor and publicize protectionist measures, hoping that would embarrass countries into rolling back any new subsidies or other trade restrictions.
Falling demand in wealthy countries is expected to produce the first yearly decline in world trade since 1982, the World Bank estimates, and the largest decline in 80 years.
Of the 51 countries reporting fourth-quarter data for 2008, the World Bank said, 36 show double-digit declines in exports, compared with a year earlier, using figures that aren't adjusted for inflation.
In October 2008, India had its first ever year-over-year decline in exports. In Cambodia, garment manufacturers have laid off 30,000 workers -- 10% of the work force -- in the nation's main export business.
The global credit crunch has deepened the problem by raising the cost of trade finance and making it less available.
The World Bank report, citing Dealogic data, said global trade finance shrank by about 40% in the last quarter of 2008 compared with a year earlier.
Behlen Manfuacturing Co. in Columbus, Neb., said it has several big projects in Russia and Ukraine that are hung up over the lack of financing.
The company, which makes grain elevators, said that in the past, customers there could secure financing from either European or domestic sources. "Credit is just much tighter," said Lyle Burbach, president of the company's international division.
Dating back to ancient commercial hubs, trade finance -- credit lines, insurance policies and other guarantees -- enable firms in different countries to do business with each other. It's the oil that lubricates the $14 trillion or so in global trade.
Export-credit agencies provide guarantees that government will share
losses in trade deals that go sour.
The World Bank and other development agencies provide similar guarantees in countries too poor to have such export financing. That is usually been sufficient to spur financing.
In the current financial crisis, banks are wary of lending to one another, so different types of government financing are being rolled out.
In the U.S., the Export-Import Bank has increased its direct lending to banks that use the funds to finance export businesses.
The World Bank is also starting a similar program for poorer nations. Under the U.S.-U.K. initiative, funding for both trade guarantees and direct lending would be greatly increased.