Kenyan leader says World Bank, IMF 'hostages' to rich nations

safiya982

We need to specify in this Paris agreement that we need a new financial mechanism to confront climate change that is not controlled by a shareholder or that is not subject to the interest of any country,” he said in an interview. Ruto said the new “mechanism”, which would be similar to a global green bank, should be financed by green taxes and levies applied globally. This could include taxes on financial transactions and fossil fuels or levies on shipping and aviation, which could raise between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion a year, he said. While France has pushed for a tax on shipping emissions, talks on other global climate tax initiatives have been inconclusive. A World Bank paper in 2022 estimated that introducing a tax or other measures to impose a price on greenhouse gas emissions from shipping could generate $60 billion in revenue a year.

He had discussed his proposal with international leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron, who is co-hosting the summit with Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley.Macron was only lukewarm, or “comme ci, comme ça,” about Russia Mobile Number List the idea of ​​a new green bank, Ruto said. But all of Africa backed his suggestion, he said, while China, which has become the largest single lender to the developing world in recent years, was aware of Kenya's position. Ruto, who last month suggested African leaders could ditch the US dollar to facilitate trade within the continent, will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping later this year to discuss issues including climate change. Ruto is part of a growing cohort of voices from low- and middle-income countries criticizing the World Bank and the IMF. Mottley last year established the so-called Bridgetown Initiative to drive the transformation of the global financial system.



We need to fix the system,” he told the FT this week. Ruto said a new bank that operated independently of the traditional financial architecture was key to ensuring countries like Kenya did not rack up huge debt as they sought to reduce emissions and transform their energy systems. Nations, including Kenya, pay much more to borrow money than their Western counterparts, creating a vicious cycle of debt, he argued. He said Africans “don't want to end up” paying “eight times more” for loans than richer countries. “We want to pay equally for everyone,” she said. Kenya, East Africa's economic powerhouse, spends about $5 billion a year on debt repayments. Ruto's predecessor, Uhuru Kenyatta, borrowed heavily from Beijing.