The 2018 G20 Summit was held in the city of Buenos
Aires, Argentina. Nineteen leaders of the world’s biggest economies and a
representative of the European Union held a meeting on November 30, 2018 as part
of the G20 summit. It is the 13th meeting of Group of Twenty (G20) and the
first G20 summit to be hosted in South America.
About G20:
Formed in 1999, the G20 is an international forum
of the governments and central bank governors from 20 major economies.
Collectively, the G20 economies account for around
85 percent of the Gross World Product (GWP), 80 percent of world trade.
To tackle the problems or the address issues that
plague the world, the heads of governments of the G20 nations periodically participate
in summits. In addition to it, the group also hosts separate meetings of the
finance ministers and foreign ministers.
The G20 has no permanent staff of its own and its
chairmanship rotates annually between nations divided into regional groupings.
The first G20 Summit was held in Berlin in
December 1999 and was hosted by the finance ministers of Germany and Canada.
Objectives:
· The Group was
formed with an aim of studying, reviewing, and promoting high-level discussion
of policy issues pertaining to the promotion of international financial
stability.
· The forum aims
to pre-empt balance of payments problems and turmoil on financial markets by
improved coordination of monetary, fiscal, and financial policies.
· The forum
seeks to address issues that go beyond the responsibilities of any one
organisation.
Member Countries:
The members of the G20 consist of 19 individual
countries plus the European Union (EU).
The 19 member countries of the forum are
Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia,
Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey,
United Kingdom and the United States.
The European Union is represented by the European
Commission and by the European Central Bank.
Shaktikanta Das, the former Secretary of the
Department of Economic Affairs (DEA), has been appointed as India’s G20 Sherpa
till December 31, 2018 for the Development Track of the G20 summit. A Sherpa is
a personal representative of the leader of a member country at an international
Summit meeting such as the G8, G20 or the Nuclear Security Summit and are
responsible for thrashing out the details before the meeting of the leaders.
