IMF advocates loosening up of trade barriers

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has cajoled policymakers to undo trade barriers, take charge of geopolitical tensions and reduce domestic policy uncertainty. This suggestion follows the recent growth forecast for 2019 to 3%, the slowest since the 2008 global financial crisis.

Gita Gopinath, Economic Counsellor and Director of the Research Department at IMF opined: “Monetary policy cannot be the only game in town. It should be coupled with fiscal support where fiscal space is available, and policy is not already too expansionary”. She also wrote that it is essential that effective macro-prudential regulation be deployed to prevent mispricing of risk and excessive build-up of financial vulnerabilities.