Perhaps unsurprisingly given the geopolitical tensions dominating this year’s Spring Meetings of the IMF and World Bank Group held in Washington DC, the International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC) failed to issue a joint communique for the 7th occasion running. The IMFC is a group of ministers of finance which are responsible for setting the policy direction of the IMF and shaping the international financial system. The Chair of the IMFC, Mr. Mohammed Aljadaan, Minister for Finance of Saudi Arabia, released a statement, as did other members.

IMFC echoes new US Administration’s position

The Chair’s statement echoed the sentiments given by the IMF Managing Director, Kristalina Georgieva, over the week of the meetings, in addition to the forecasts of the World Economic Outlook, which slashed global growth forecasts and pointed to heightened uncertainty. In the statements issued at previous meetings, previous IMFC chairs called for renewed commitments to multilateralism, and while this was somewhat muted in the statement at last year’s Annuals (see Dispatch Annuals 2024), it still posited the IMF at the centre of a rules-based international economic system and warned against protectionism.

There was a marked difference in the statement given at this year’s Spring Meetings following the election of US President Donald Trump, and its turn away from international institutions which, as Walden Bello describes, have “sought to make the world safe for US capital through the projection of US military and political power and free trade”, towards a far right protectionism. In response, the management of the IMF appears to have adopted a strategy of warning that what they euphemistically refer to as trade “volatility” risks causing a global economic downturn to which even rich countries will not be immune, while at the same time appealing to the shareholders of those countries to continue to support the international order that they have long benefited from.

The Chair’s statement therefore stressed that “elevated uncertainty” is leading to market volatility and could subsequently result in risks to growth and financial stability. The elephant in the room – the fact that the already chronically unsustainable economic and financial system presided over by the IMF is now under threat due to the effects of the domestic politics of its largest shareholder – was not mentioned . Instead, the Chair’s statement reflected Georgieva’s olive branch to the US – that the upcoming reviews of two of the IMF’s core functions – surveillance and conditionality – will result in an institution that can be reshaped in the current US administration’s image – promising a more “effective” and “sharpened” focus. While the statement makes one reference to climate “transitions” stating that it presents both “opportunities” and “challenges”, tackling these challenges is not mentioned. Instead, the chair states that the global economy needs “comprehensive and well calibrated, well sequenced, and well communicated reforms and policy actions are needed to boost private sector-led growth, productivity, and job creation” – almost word for word echoing the IMFC statement by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant, including notably a reference to “streamlining excessive regulation.”

Debt and distributional impacts in focus but no movement on quotas

The distributional impacts of IMF policy do warrant a mention, however. As civil society organisations have long argued, the IMF’s policy agenda of continued fiscal consolidation, has, according to its own research, had a dampening effect on growth, which analysts point out have been consistently underestimated by the institution (see Dispatch Springs 2025). Previous reviews of the IMF’s conditionality and surveillance found that the IMF suffers from “optimism bias” in its growth projections, and despite the proliferation of structural conditionality has often failed to tackle the real causes of economic stagnation or deal adequately with distributional or social impacts (see Observer Spring 2025). It remains to be seen whether the upcoming reviews will be able to achieve real progress in tackling these areas.

The chair’s statement also refers to debt and the ongoing review of the Debt Sustainability Framework for Low Income Countries (LIC-DSF ), which has been a focus of the Spring Meetings in a crucial jubilee year where debt groups are calling for action on urgent debt relief and reform to the international financial architecture, and in the discussions taking place in the run up to the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development. The current debt crisis, which is both structural and systemic to the functioning of the global economy, is likely to be worsened by the fallout from the policies of rich countries, in particular unilateral tariffs imposed by the US and steep cuts in overseas development assistance. The measures so far promoted by the IMF to deal with it including the G20 Common Framework and the ‘three pillar approach,’ which focuses on domestic resource mobilisation, attracting private capital and “growth enhancing reforms,” are wholly inadequate to meet the demands of the current moment which requires a systemic approach to debt relief.

Finally, the chair raised the issue of quota reform, in an admission that the IMF has failed to fully ratify the 16th General Review of Quotas (GRQ), which in the statement’s words “remains a priority”. However, while the Annuals 2024 statement contained a commitment to developing by June 2025 “possible approaches as a guide for further quota realignment” (see Dispatch Annuals 2024), this has now been delayed to the 2026 Spring Meetings and downgraded to a “set of principles to guide future discussions.” The IMFC clearly views the current moment as a critical juncture, yet its over-reliance on its largest shareholder means the IMF’s ability to respond to key challenges appears compromised.