Singapore talks focus on US$10b Asia initiative
Singapore talks focus on US$10b Asia initiative
SINGAPORE (Reuters): The outcome of a two-day meeting on East Asian corporate and bank restructuring will be the basis for talks this week on how to deploy a US$10 billion growth fund for the crisis-hit region, officials said Saturday.
"These meetings will give us information we need to take to the Asia Growth and Recovery Initiative (AGRI) talks on Monday," a member of Thailand's delegation to the meeting told Reuters.
AGRI is a US$10 billion multilateral initiative led by the United States and Japan with the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to help nurture recovery in the region.
A meeting co-chaired by the United States and Japan will be held in Singapore on Monday and will include officials from the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, ADB and various members of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group.
The Thai official, speaking on the sidelines of the two-day restructuring conference co-sponsored by the World Bank and the Singapore-based Pacific Economic Cooperation Council, said he expected concrete progress on how the AGRI funds would be used.
"These talks should enable the senior officials next week to draw up some policy measures on how to use these funds to begin the recovery process," he said.
Overviews on the progress of restructuring efforts and the financing needs of various countries have topped the agenda for the two days of discussion which began on Friday.
Conference participants included officials from China's finance ministry and central bank, Indonesia's central bank and bank restructuring agency, Malaysia's finance ministry, South Korea's corporate restructuring committee and Thailand's central bank and finance ministry.
Saturday's session focused on financial sector restructuring, with progress reports from Thailand, South Korea and Indonesia taking center stage, said an official from one finance ministry in attendance, who declined to be identified.
Indonesia's government has closed 38 banks, taken over seven and plans to recapitalize another nine in moves aimed to prepare the way for recovery from its worst recession in 30 years.
Thai banks have been crippled by bad loans amounting to about 44 percent of total lending, or about 2.7 trillion baht (US$71.2 billion), central bank figures showed.
South Korea has already set aside some 64 trillion won and could need another 10 trillion won ($8.16 billion) for restructuring a financial sector bogged down by bad loans that are eventually estimated to peak at 118 trillion won.
"It has been useful to bring together all these people to explain the current situation, but we still need more details and they are sometimes lacking," the finance ministry official said.
"Some countries are reluctant to bring out some details in such open discussions," the Thai official said.